Why would someone say "left for dead" but not "left to die" or "left for his/her death" ?
I'm not a native English speaker but I do understand the meaning of that phrase. From a grammatical point of view, why would we use an adjective here ?
Learn English – Usage of “left for dead”
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Contrary to the other answers, I think "she left me for another woman" is perfectly fine, and does not imply anything about her earlier relationships (other than with the speaker). It is true that in a sentence like "she left me for another man", the another means other than myself, a meaning which does not apply (since the speaker is male) to "she left me for another woman". But here, "another" can mean other than herself. For instance, in a sentence like "Shane was pleased to see another Australian in Cairo", the "another" only means "other than himself", and does not imply that he'd seen other Australians before. Similarly, "she left me for another woman" does not necessarily imply that she'd been with a woman before, I think.
That said, I think "she left me for a woman" is fine, too. It does not have the problem you mentioned that "she left me for a man" would have (self-deprecation on part of the male speaker), and if some people are going to (mis?)interpret "another woman" as meaning that there was already another "another woman", then it's probably best to avoid "another".
To understand what this simple phrase means first think of the literal meaning, that the person was abandoned because it was assumed that they were already dead, mortally wounded or that it was inevitable that they die.
But there is more to the phrase than that. In common usage, this phrase is often part of a narrative where a person was expected to die, yet against the odds they survived. Some examples from COCA:
Left for dead by a busy road, Susan managed to get a ride to a police station where she insisted she be brought to the Nairobi Women's Hospital.
Pueschel, just 11-years-old, was beaten, stabbed and left for dead, but he lived to testify against Reginald and Gerry Mahaffe.
... a young man in Los Angeles was robbed, shot, left for dead, but he lived because a bullet was stopped by a radio in his pocket.
The common theme in these stories is an act of cruelty towards an innocent person who survives either by a stroke of luck or a miracle. A proper reading of the title Left for Dead should include cruelty, abandonment but also a sense of hope.
Best Answer
"Left for dead" and "left to die" are both used. In fact, "left to die" is somewhat more common. (See the ngram below.)
The two, though, have slight different meanings.
You ask why we would use for dead. These differences can carry a lot. The latter has an extra nonchalance or disregard: you don't care enough about the person to see if they are alive. Alternatively, the former could be more malicious (you know they are alive and choose not to help) or despairing (you know they are alive but that there is nothing you can do).