inundate
verbUK /ˈɪn.ənˌdeɪt/ · CA, US /ˈɪn.ənˌdeɪt/
Etymology First attested in 1623; borrowed from Latin inundātus, the perfect passive participle of inundō (“to flood, overflow”) (see -ate (verb-forming suffix)), from in- + undō (“to overflow, wave”), from unda (“wave”) + -ō (verb-forming suffix).
1
To cover with large amounts of water; to flood.
- The Dutch would sometimes inundate the land to hinder the Spanish army.
2
To overwhelm.
- The agency was inundated with phone calls.
- I don't know any quarter in England where you get such undeniable mutton—mutton that eats like mutton, instead of the nasty watery, stringy, turnipy stuff, neither mutton nor lamb, that other countries are inundated with.1852, The New Monthly Magazine, page 310:
1 more example
- That books are pouring off the world’s presses at unprecedented rates is a fact often alluded to as a flood that is inundating libraries and the book trades.1972, Carol A. Nemeyer, Scholarly Reprint Publishing in the United States, New York, N.Y.: R. R. Bowker Co., →ISBN, page 8:
- Related terms
- inundation, inundator, undulate