terminated

1. 1
   verb

   Simple past and past participle of terminate.

   Management terminated the agreement after repeated delays.

   The lease was terminated once the tenant stopped paying rent.

   Note

   One spelling does two jobs. Standing alone it is the simple past (management terminated the deal). After has or a form of be it is the participle (the lease was terminated). It carries every meaning of terminate: ending a contract, fitting a terminal to a cable, firing an employee. Because terminate is also a euphemism for killing, a bare passive like "he was terminated" can read darkly when context is thin.

2. 2
   adjective

   Having lost a job or assignment after being dismissed by an employer.

   The terminated manager spent weeks updating her résumé and networking.

   Several terminated contractors disputed the decision through their union.

   Similardismissed, fired, sacked

3. 3
   adjective

   Brought to an end or destroyed as the result of a deliberate termination.

   The terminated contract freed both companies to seek new partners.

   Engineers reviewed the terminated experiment to learn what had gone wrong.

   Similarcanceled, aborted, discontinued, ended

   Oppositeongoing

4. 4
   adjective

   Having a definite end or boundary rather than continuing without limit.

   The terminated wall ended abruptly at the cliff's edge.

   Surveyors mapped the terminated boundary where the field met the river.

   Note

   Here nothing has been stopped. The word describes a shape: something with a limit rather than something that runs on. It echoes the bounding meaning of terminate, "to set or be a limit or boundary to," and unlike the "ended" meaning it implies no act and no agent. A terminated wall simply stops at its edge, while a terminated contract was cut off by someone.

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