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partially destroyed

CORALINNA

Senior Member
Portuguese - Brasil
It's ok to use partially in these sentences, right?

Homes were partially destroyed.
Forests were partially destroyed.
Your sentences are grammatically sound, but I have a problem using "partially" with "destroyed."

"Destroyed" means there's nothing left, so how can something be "partially destroyed"? 👁 Eek! :o
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I understand what you say. Is there a word (similar to destroy) that would go with "partially" in these situations?
I still think "partially" is not needed.

Many homes were destroyed. (This is probably what you mean to say...some, but not all homes.)
Forests were devastated or (Not completely destroyed, so "partially" is implied.)

Hope that helps! 👁 Smile :)
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Ok, thanks. I got it. They are all collocations. They don't make sense in English but they do in Portuguese.
Would it work any better for you, Julie, if it were "partly" instead of "partially"?
If part of a building is destroyed, but the rest of it is intact, then the whole building could be said to be partly destroyed. No?
A forest fire can easily destroy only half a forest, leaving the rest unharmed.

Without source or context, we don't know whether the OP meant that some but not all of the homes/forests were completely destroyed (partially applies to the number of homes), or whether some or all of them were destroyed "incompletely" (partially applies to each home/forest).
To destroy does not usually mean there 'nothing left'. To destroy generally means to damage so badly that it is fundamentally changed e.g into ashes or wreckage and can no longer perform its normal function.

E.g. "The bomb destroyed the house" means the walls and roof collapsed to the ground and the building uninhabitable.
It's also common to hear that something was 'completely destroyed' and I think that some things, especially big things with multiple parts, can be partially destroyed.

E.g. The mall was partially destroyed by the earthquake.
The appartment block was partially destroyed by fire; the topmost ten floors were completely destroyed but the lower floors were undamaged.
Not that I disagree with Linkway because I know I sometimes qualify destroyed as well, but there are those - including The Associated Press Stylebook - that assert that destroyed is an absolute. That just as you can't be slightly pregnant or somewhat unique, you can't be partly (or partially) destroyed. Coralinna should be aware that although qualifying destroyed is fairly common, it is not universally accepted.
Not that I disagree with Linkway because I know I sometimes qualify destroyed as well, but there are those - including The Associated Press Stylebook - that assert that destroyed is an absolute. That just as you can't be slightly pregnant or somewhat unique, you can't be partly (or partially) destroyed. Coralinna should be aware that although qualifying destroyed is fairly common, it is not universally accepted.
👁 Thumbs Up :thumbsup:
👁 Thumbs Up :thumbsup:


(It's like being "completely dead")
Common sense suggests that "The bridge was destroyed" means that the bridge was so badly damaged that it could no longer be used as a bridge. Even if parts were not destroyed, the bridge as a whole was destroyed; it was not a bridge any more in functional terms.

If you said "The factory was destroyed by fire" it would generally mean that the factory as a whole was destroyed, possibly but NOT necessarily every part of the factory.

However, if you said "The factory was partly/partially destroyed by fire" that would imply, to me at least, that some some parts were destroyed, while some other parts were merely damaged or even escaped damage.

I suppose a lot depends on what you mean by partly/partially. I was using it in the sense that some parts were and some were not.

The comparison with using "completely dead" is not at all appropriate. To say that an oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico killed many sea creatures does not mean that all sea creatures in that area were killed - a lot of fish and sea birds were killed / a lot of sea life was destroyed, but certainly not all of it; gulf sea life was not completely destroyed.
The comparison with using "completely dead" is not at all appropriate. To say that an oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico killed many sea creatures does not mean that all sea creatures in that area were killed - a lot of fish and sea birds were killed / a lot of sea life was destroyed, but certainly not all of it; gulf sea life was not completely destroyed.
I rather think "completely dead" was suggested not in the sense that a population might be incompletely dead, but that an individual might be:

"Eek! A mouse! Help!", she cried, and quick as a flash jumped up on a chair, nervously shifting her weight back and forth from one foot to the other.
"Don't worry, darling", quoth her hero as he smote the hapless rodent with a single blow of his walking stick, "You can come back down now".
"Are you sure it's completely dead? I think it's still wriggling".

👁 Smile :)
[Source: my own]
Still the point of difficulty is
"Parts of the factory were destroyed, but some parts were lightly damaged and others not damaged at all."
"The XYZ factory was completely destroyed by the explosion, but the ABC factory less than a hundred meters away was only partly destroyed."


And is this complete nonsense?
"The forest was destroyed by fire in November last year. Now in spring we can see the first green shoots growing from the charred remains."

i.e. the "forest" was destroyed but even the badly damaged trees were not "completely dead".

I also cannot agree with the earlier statement:
"Destroyed" means there's nothing left, ..."
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