Adjacent Words

Dreadful definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

DREADFUL, a.
1. Impressing great fear; terrible; formidable; as a dreadful storm, or dreadful night.
The great and dreadful day of the Lord. Malachi 4.
2. Awful; venerable.
How dreadful is this place. Genesis 48.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: causing fear or dread or terror; "the awful war"; "an awful risk"; "dire news"; "a career or vengeance so direful that London was shocked"; "the dread presence of the headmaster"; "polio is no longer the dreaded disease it once was"; "a dreadful storm"; "a fearful howling"; "horrendous explosions shook the city"; "a terrible curse" [syn: awful, dire, direful, dread, dreaded, dreadful, fearful, fearsome, frightening, horrendous, horrific, terrible]
2: exceptionally bad or displeasing; "atrocious taste"; "abominable workmanship"; "an awful voice"; "dreadful manners"; "a painful performance"; "terrible handwriting"; "an unspeakable odor came sweeping into the room" [syn: atrocious, abominable, awful, dreadful, painful, terrible, unspeakable]
3: very unpleasant

Merriam Webster's

I. adjective Date: 13th century 1. a. inspiring dread ; causing great and oppressive fear <a dreadful storm> b. inspiring awe or reverence <the dreadful sublimity of the mountain peaks> 2. extremely bad, distasteful, unpleasant, or shocking <a dreadful performance> <dreadful news> 3. extreme <dreadful disorder> • dreadfully adverb • dreadfulness noun II. noun Date: circa 1873 a cheap and sensational story or periodical

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. 1 terrible; inspiring fear or awe. 2 colloq. troublesome, disagreeable; very bad. Derivatives: dreadfully adv. dreadfulness n.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Dreadful Dread"ful, a. 1. Full of dread or terror; fearful. [Obs.] ``With dreadful heart.'' --Chaucer. 2. Inspiring dread; impressing great fear; fearful; terrible; as, a dreadful storm. `` Dreadful gloom.'' --Milton. For all things are less dreadful than they seem. --Wordsworth. 3. Inspiring awe or reverence; awful. [Obs.] ``God's dreadful law.'' --Shak. Syn: Fearful; frightful; terrific; terrible; horrible; horrid; formidable; tremendous; awful; venerable. See Frightful.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

1. If you say that something is dreadful, you mean that it is very bad or unpleasant, or very poor in quality. They told us the dreadful news... = awful, appalling ADJ • dreadfully You behaved dreadfully... ADV: ADV with v 2. Dreadful is used to emphasize the degree or extent of something bad. We've made a dreadful mistake... = terrible ADJ: ADJ n [emphasis] • dreadfully He looks dreadfully ill... ADV: ADV adj, ADV after v 3. If someone looks or feels dreadful, they look or feel very ill, tired, or upset. Are you all right? You look dreadful... ADJ: feel/look ADJ

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

a. 1. Terrible, horrible, horrid, direful, dire, fearful, frightful, terrific, awful, tremendous, formidable. 2. Venerable, awful.

Moby Thesaurus

Bildungsroman, Gothic novel, abominable, alarming, appalling, arrant, astounding, atrocious, august, awe-inspiring, awesome, awful, awfully, bad, baneful, base, beastly, beneath contempt, big, blameworthy, brutal, comic novel, contemptible, damned, deadly, demonic, deplorable, despicable, detective novel, detestable, devilish, diabolical, dime novel, dire, direful, disgusting, dread, dreaded, dreadfully, egregious, enormous, epistolary novel, erotic novel, estimable, evil, exceedingly, feared, fearful, fearsome, fell, fetid, fiendish, filthy, flagitious, flagrant, forbidding, formidable, foul, frightening, frightful, fulsome, ghastly, ghoulish, grievous, grim, grisly, gross, gruesome, hateful, heinous, hideous, historical novel, honorable, horrendous, horrible, horrid, horrific, horrifying, howling, infamous, iniquitous, lamentable, loathsome, lousy, macabre, malefic, maleficent, malevolent, monstrous, morbid, nasty, nefarious, noisome, notorious, nouvelle, novel, novel of character, novel of ideas, novel of incident, novel of manners, novel of sensibility, novelette, novella, obnoxious, odious, offensive, outrageous, penny dreadful, picaresque novel, pitiable, pitiful, pornographic novel, problem novel, proletarian novel, propaganda novel, psychological novel, rank, rattling, redoubtable, regional novel, regrettable, remarkably, repelling, reprehensible, repugnant, repulsive, reverend, revolting, river novel, roman, roman a clef, roman-fleuve, rotten, rousing, sad, satirical novel, scandalous, scary, schlock, schrecklich, science-fiction novel, scurvy, sentimental novel, shabby, shameful, shilling, shilling shocker, shocking, shoddy, short story, short-short, sociological novel, sordid, squalid, storiette, stream-of-consciousness novel, strikingly, terrible, terrific, thesis novel, thumping, time-honored, too bad, tragic, tremendous, unclean, unspeakable, venerable, vignette, vile, villainous, whacking, wicked, woeful, worshipful, worst, worthless, wretched