Killed animals for food; also informally means defeated overwhelmingly or criticized harshly.
From Old Norse 'sloghtr' (butchering). The word entered English in the 1500s specifically for killing animals at large scale, then expanded to mean any violent killing.
The word 'slaughter' started as a specific industrial process but now describes any overwhelming defeat—'our team got slaughtered'—which shows how words tied to violence leak into everyday speech, sometimes numbing us to the original meaning.
Complete word intelligence in one call. Free tier — 50 lookups/day.