body count

Noun

body count (plural body counts)

1. The number of persons or bodies counted as casualties, especially fatalities, or victims.
   • Senator BYRD of West Virginia. Why do we minimize our losses as apparently we do? I find it extremely difficult to believe that there have been 6,200 VC and NVA killed by body count, whereas we have only lost 193 Americans and 335 ARVN troops.1968 February 1, “Authorization for Military Procurement, Research and Development, Fiscal Year 1969, and Reserve Strength”, in (Please provide the book title or journal name), United States....
   • Navy Lt. Cole Cowden, accused of indecent assault and conduct unbecoming an officer at the 1991 Tailhook convention, says he is the target of a quest for a 'body count' in the investigation and not because he did anything wrong at the annual convention of Naval aviators.1993 July 16, “Tailhook defendant rails at accusers”, in UPI Archives
   1. Of a killer, especially a serial killer, the number of people who have been killed by a given individual.
2. (slang) The total number of sexual partners of a given individual.
   • The numbers don’t matter. It’s not a body count, a scratch-pad list or a boast. Statistics obscure intent and meaning. My toll is therefore ambiguous. Girlfriends, wives, one-night stands, paid companions. Chaste early figures. A high-stat blitz later on. Quantity means shit in my case.2010 September 7, James Ellroy [pseudonym; Lee Earle Ellroy], chapter 1, in The Hilliker Curse: My Pursuit of Women, New York, N.Y.: Alfred A. Knopf, →ISBN, page 3
   • [He wants] sex even if he has the woman he wants, just to increase his body count. He strings you along just for the sex. Tell you what you wanna hear but never follow thru, heck! Some modern women go so far as paying his bills and car payments.2021 December 14, Karen Kellock, UNDERHANDEDLY CLEVER, CHAMPION GUIDES, →ISBN, page 27

   Synonyms:

   notch count, mileage

3. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see body, count.
   • ...based upon a February visit of GAO to Houston where they were not keeping statistics, the figure from GAO, as I was told yesterday, is that Houston has only 11 jobs for Vietnam veterans. No, they haven't kept a body count, but our estimate is far higher.1984, “Oversight on the Domestic Volunteer Service Act: Hearing ...”, in (Please provide the book title or journal name), United States. Congress. House. Committee on Education and Labor....
   • Mrs. Phillips, taking after Austen’s letters, tallies ducks by the couple, making effectively a body count—it’s three couple of ducks rather than six or a half dozen.2019 April 26, David Sigler, “2 Jane Austen: Comedy against Happiness”, in Erin Goss, editor, Jane Austen and Comedy (Transits: Literature, Thought & Culture 1650-1850), Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell...