Decimate

If you're anything like me, you think decimate sounds pretty detrimental. If a horde of orcs decimated the Shire, you'd expect the Shire to be pretty flattened and burned to the ground, with nearly all the hobbits dead, right?

Not under Gandalf's watch, you wouldn't.

But in reality, only one-tenth of the hobbits would be dead. You see, decimate means to kill, destroy, or remove one in every ten of something.

It also used to refer to tithing, because people were meant to give 10% to the church.

It can also mean to divide into tenths.

Decimate has the same root as decimal: deci- means ten, like how octo- means eight or tri- means three.

Let's get Kitchen Lion to help us out here:

The lion in the kitchen decimated the cabinets; there were ten, but now there are only nine. The tenth one was destroyed by the lion.

Thank you, Kitchen Lion!