Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb Australia, colloquial To bring down from within; to undermine.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From white ant ("termite"), suggesting the action of termites eating the inside of wooden building foundations, often leaving no outward evidence until the structure begins to crumble.

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Examples

  • They came to a stick, which, being inclosed in a white-ant gallery, I knew contained numbers of this insect; but I was surprised to see the black soldiers passing without touching it.

    Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa 2004

  • Along tracks where the spears are readily available there are few white-ant nests untormented by two or three.

    My Tropic Isle 2003

  • The ANC is now stronger than at any time when S'fiso Nkabinde was infiltrated into our ranks with the sole aim to white-ant the ANC from within.

    ANC Daily News Briefing 1998

  • Out-bush we take the good with the bad as we find it; so we sat among towering white-ant hills, drinking as little of the tea as possible and enjoying the damper and "push" with hungry relish.

    We of the Never-Never Jeannie Gunn 1915

  • Along tracks where the spears are readily available there are few white-ant nests untormented by two or three.

    My Tropic Isle 1887

  • Outside there was a great deal of masonry work as hard and firm as that on white-ant hills, in the middle of which was a neat circular hole just large enough for the passage of the bird.

    The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds, Volume 1 Allan Octavian Hume 1870

  • -- Where there are no stones of which ovens may be built, and where there are old white-ant hills, the natives commonly dig holes in the sides of the ant hills and use them for that purpose.

    The Art of Travel Shifts and Contrivances Available in Wild Countries Francis Galton 1866

  • -- In Damara land, where there is no natural material fitted for pottery, the savages procured mud from the interior of the white-ant hills, with which they made their pots.

    The Art of Travel Shifts and Contrivances Available in Wild Countries Francis Galton 1866

  • Presently, however, one with her hind leg broken pulled up on a white-ant hill, and, tossing her horns, came down with a charge the instant I showed myself close to her.

    The Discovery of the Source of the Nile John Hanning Speke 1845

  • As it resists the white-ant, an insect that destroys oak and every other kind of wood, and is never subject to the dry-rot, it is invaluable for building purposes.

    The Bushman — Life in a New Country Edward Wilson Landor 1844

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