deletive

English

Etymology

from delete +‎ -ive.

Adjective

deletive (comparative more deletive, superlative most deletive)

Tending to delete or obliterate.
lexical deletive rules
- 1662, J[ohn] Evelyn, “Of Sculpture, how Deriv’d, and Distinguish’d, with the Styles, and Instruments Belonging to It”, in Sculptura: Or The History, and Art of Chalcography and Engraving in Copper. […], London: […] J[ames] C[ottrel] for G. Beedle [i.e., Gabriel Bedell], and T[homas] Collins, […], and J[ohn] Crook […], →OCLC, book I, page 9:
  [T]he obtuſer end [of a style] vvas made more deletive, apt to put out, and obliterate, vvhen they vvould Stylum vertere [turn the style], vvhich our Burniſher (another Tool us'd by Chalcographers) and Poliſher performes.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “deletive”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)