英和和英

発音

名詞

rack and ruin (uncountable)

1. (idiomatic, proscribed) Complete destruction.
   • 1599, Thomas Fowler, The history of Corpus Christi College:

     In the mean season the College shall goe to rack and ruin.^[1]

使用する際の注意点

Etymologically incorrect, due to confusion of rack (“torture, suffer”) with wrack (“destroy”). Correct is wrack and ruin, which is accordingly preferred by style guides; however, both are common and well-established. Unusually, rack and ruin replaces wrack with rack, presumably by alliteration; other confusions instead replace rack with wrack.

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