Abstract The mechanisms of growth and destruction of continental lithosphere have been long debated. We define and test a unifying plate tectonic driving mechanism that explains the numerous petrological, geophysical, and geological features that characterize the destruction of cratonic lithospheric roots. Data from three Archean cratons demonstrate that loss of their roots is related to rollback of subducted flat slabs, some along the mantle transition zone, beneath the cratons. During flat slab subduction dehydration reactions add water to the overlying mantle wedge. As the subducting slabs roll back, they suck in mantle material to infill the void space created by the slab roll back, and this fertile mantle becomes hydrated. The roll-back causes concomitant lithospheric thinning of the overlying craton so the flux of newly hydrated mantle material inevitably rises causing adiabatic melting, generating new magmas that gradually destroy the roots of the overlying craton through melt–peridotite reactions. Calculated fluxes of new mantle material beneath cratons that have lost their roots range from 2.7 trillion to 70 million cubic kilometers, which is sufficient to generate enough melt to completely replace the affected parts of the destroyed cratons. Cratonic lithosphere may be destroyed in massive quantities through this mechanism, warranting a re-evaluation of continental growth rates with time.