liquidation (n.)

1570s, in law, of debts, noun of action from past participle stem of Late Latin liquidare "melt, make liquid" (see liquidate). Originally as a legal term in reference to assets; of companies going out of business, 1869; of inconvenient groups of persons, "a killing, a wiping out," 1925 in communist writings. In O. Henry, "the act of taking a drink of liquor."