Meaning & use
ransack
Last updated
Meanings
verbtransitive
To search a place wildly and carelessly, throwing things around, usually to find something valuable or to steal.
Grammar: Always takes an object: burglars ransacked the house.
Patterns
- ransack something
- ransack something for something
Burglars ransacked the apartment and left drawers hanging open.
She ransacked her bag for the missing keys.
Someone had ransacked the office, scattering papers across the floor.
verbtransitiveliterary
To rob and destroy a town or building by force, as invading soldiers did in the past.
Grammar: Often used in history writing about raids and wars.
Patterns
- ransack a town
- be ransacked by someone
Raiders ransacked the village and carried off its grain.
The monastery was ransacked several times during the war.
verbtransitivefigurative
To search through memories, records or ideas thoroughly in the hope of finding something useful.
Grammar: A figurative use, usually followed by a noun like memory or archives.
Patterns
- ransack your memory
- ransack something for something
He ransacked his memory for the name of the song.
The writer ransacked old newspapers for details of the trial.
Word forms
| third person singular | ransacks |
|---|---|
| past tense | ransacked |
| past participle | ransacked |
| -ing form | ransacking |
Common combinations
- ransack a house
- Thieves ransacked a house on our street last week.
- ransack the drawers
- She ransacked the drawers looking for her passport.
- ransack your memory
- I ransacked my memory but could not recall his face.
- ransack the shelves
- Panic buyers ransacked the shelves before the storm.
- ransack a village
- The invaders ransacked a village and set fire to its barns.
Synonyms and how they differ
- rummage
- Rummage is gentler and can be harmless, as in rummaging in a drawer, whereas ransack implies mess and damage.
- plunder
- Plunder focuses on stealing goods by force, often in war, while ransack focuses on the rough searching.
- loot
- Loot emphasizes taking things during chaos or crime, but not necessarily making a mess searching.
- pillage
- Pillage is a stronger, more formal word for robbing and destroying a place during war.
Opposites
Word family
- ransacked adjective
- searched roughly and left in disorder
- ransacking noun
- the act of ransacking a place
Commonly confused: ransack or ransom?
ransack vs ransom
A ransom is money paid to free a captive; ransack is a verb meaning to search and wreck a place. They begin the same but are unrelated in meaning.
Practice
Which sentence uses ransack correctly?
Choose one answer.
Ransack implies a rough, messy search, as in the burglars example. A careful, orderly search would be wrong, and the other options do not take a place or container as an object.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “ransack”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.