denude

present singular third person denudes · participle present denuding · participle past denuded · past denuded

1. To divest of all covering; to make bare or naked; to strip.

   He denuded himself of his clothes.

   3 more examples

   Widespread deforestation has led to lands being denuded.

   But King Piko had been long harassed with the thought, that the unobstructed and indefinite increase of his browsing subjects might eventually denude of herbage his portion of the island.

   1849, Herman Melville, Mardi: And a Voyage Thither. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC

   They not only visit adultery on the guilty man himself by beating him, but the men proceed en masse to the house of his parents and denude it of all furniture, stores of grain, and merchandise.

   1898, Arnold Henry Savage Landor, In the Forbidden Land

2. To remove (something or someone) of their possessions or assets.

   Their property was seized, denuded and confiscated.

   2 more examples

   The service was denuded of its capacity to deliver.

   And Louisa, a niece of Pierre, claimed his inheritance on the death of Suzanne. Thus, in her cruel anger, she hoped to denude the Constable of the whole of the heritage of his dead wife.

   1886, A. Mary F. Robinson, Margaret of Angoulême, Queen of Navarre

3. geographyTo strip (a mountain, volcano, or other geological formation) by erosion of outer layers so as to lay bare the inner structure.

   The well-known hill of Arthur’s Seat, which overlooks the city of Edinburgh, and many castle-crowned crags of the Forth and Clyde valleys, are the worn and denuded relics of these small volcanoes.

   1903, John W. Judd, Volcanoes: What they are and what they teach, page 275