English Explanatory Dictionary

gruesome

English dictionary entry

Meanings

adj
  1. Repellently frightful and shocking; ghastly, horrific.
  2. Awful, terrible.
  3. Of a person: filled with fear; afraid, fearful.

Pronunciation

/ˈɡɹuːsəm/ /ˈɡɹuːsm̩/ LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-gruesome.wav /ˈɡɹusəm/

Word forms

gruesome gruesomer more gruesome gruesomest most gruesome grewsome

Etymology

From grue (“(archaic except Northern England, Scotland) to be frightened; to shudder with fear”) + -some (suffix meaning ‘characterized by some specific condition or quality, usually to a considerable degree’ forming adjectives and nouns), probably popularized by the Scottish novelist and poet Walter Scott (1771–1832): see, for example, the 1816 quotation. cognates * Danish grusom (“cruel; horrible”) * Middle Dutch grousaem, grusaem (modern Dutch gruwzaam (“cruel; gruesome”)) * Middle High German grûsam, grûwesam (modern German grausam (“cruel”)) * Norwegian Bokmål grusom (“cruel; horrible”)

Synonyms

grisly horrible affreux alarming spine-tingling appalling awful eldritch buggish butt-clenching buttock-clenching dismayful dreadful fearful flaysome flesh-crawling formidable freaky frightening frightensome frightful ghastly ghostly hair-curling hair-raising horrid horrific horrifying horripilating pulse-pounding scaring scary shocking skin-crawling terrible terrifying terrorsome abysmal atrocious bad chronic coarse corny crap crapalicious crappy crummy deityforsaken dire disagreeable dismal dogshit fifth-rate foul fourth-rate godawful hellish hideous hopeless horrendous

Antonyms

ungruesome acceptable agreeable all right amazing as fine as Dick's hatband awesome beatific bene blissful bodacious bona brilliant celestial commendable cool dandy as candy decent delightful divine enjoyable excellent exceptional fabulous fantastic fine goated goloptious good as wheat in the bin gratifying great heavenlike heavenly incredible lovely magnificent marvelous neat nice not bad outstanding perfect phenomenal pleasant pleasing positive rad radical right as rain satisfying solid splendid stellar stupendous super superb sweet sweet as a nut terrific tubular

Derived words

gruesomely gruesomeness gruesome twosome ungruesome
This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.
Back to search All on G Russian dictionary Dahl dictionary