Word.ws English Dictionary

done to death

done to death is the past participle of do to death.

Meaning of do to death

Verb

do to death (third-person singular simple present does to death, present participle doing to death, simple past did to death, past participle done to death)

  1. Of a trope, joke, topic, idea, etc, to use so often that it becomes trite.
    • It's hard to find novel screenplays. All the usual stories have been done to death.
  2. (obsolete) To put to death.
    • So will I not […] Behold ſo many of my country men,
      All done to death and ſtrangled in one day, […]1593, anonymous author, The Life and Death of Iacke Straw […], →OCLC, Act IV

Questions about done to death

What is done to death the past participle of?
Done to death is the past participle of do to death.

Words near done to death in the dictionary

  1. done the washing up
  2. done the washing-up
  3. done thing
  4. done things
  5. done time
  6. done to death
  7. done tricks on it
  8. done unto others
  9. done up
  10. done up like a dog's dinner
  11. done up like a kipper

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: done to death (page history and authors); do to death (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “done to death.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/done_to_death. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.