From the ArcaMax Publishing, Vocabulary Newsletter:
http://www.arcamax.com/news/vocabulary/s-568862-803302
expunge \ik-SPUNJ\ (transitive verb) - 1 : To strike out, erase, or
mark for deletion; to obliterate; as, "to expunge words, lines, or
sentences." 2 : To wipe out or destroy; to annihilate.
"When you talk you can't stop to polish a phrase, to search for
precisely the right word, nor can you go back and expunge a word, a
phrase, a whole paragraph." -- Henry Miller, 'Plexus'
Expunge is from Latin expungere, "to prick out, to mark (with dots)
for deletion," from ex-, "out of, from" + pungere, "to prick."