efface
verb/əˈfeɪs/ · /ɪˈfeɪs/
Etymology From Middle French effacer (“erase”), from Old French esfacier (“remove the face”).
1
To erase (as anything impressed or inscribed upon a surface); to render illegible or indiscernible.
- Do not efface what I've written on the chalkboard.
- An outline of the same device might be traced on his shield, though many a blow had almost effaced the painting.1825, Walter Scott, The Talisman, A.L. Burt Company (1832?), 15
2
To cause to disappear as if by rubbing out or striking out.
- Some people like to efface their own memories with alcohol.
- The bright records of the last hour effaced all the darker traces left by long and weary days.1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XXXI, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume III, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 254:
3
To make oneself inobtrusive as if due to modesty or diffidence.
- Many people seem shy, but they really just efface for meekness.
4
Medicine, Sciences Of the cervix during pregnancy, to thin and stretch in preparation for labor.
5
Medicine, Sciences Of a woman: to have the cervix thin and stretch in this manner.
- Some females efface 75% by the 39th week of pregnancy.
- Derived terms
- effaceable, effacement, effacer, ineffaceable, self-effacing, uneffaced
- Related terms
- deface