destroy vs erase

destroy

verb
  • To remove data. 

  • To sing a song poorly. 

  • To put down or euthanize. 

  • To exhaust duly and thus recreate or build up. 

  • To penetrate sexually in an aggressive way. 

  • To damage beyond use or repair. 

  • To severely disrupt the well-being of (a person); ruin. 

  • To defeat soundly. 

  • To neutralize, undo a property or condition. 

erase

verb
  • to remove markings or information 

  • To remove a runner from the bases via a double play or pick off play 

  • To kill; assassinate. 

  • To obliterate (information) from a storage medium, such as to clear or to overwrite. 

  • To obliterate information from (a storage medium), such as to clear or (with magnetic storage) to demagnetize. 

  • To disregard (a group, an orientation, etc.); to prevent from having an active role in society. 

  • To be erased (have markings removed, have information removed, or be cleared of information). 

noun
  • The operation of deleting data. 

How often have the words destroy and erase occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )