horrible

Hello, you have come here looking for the meaning of the word horrible. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word horrible, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say horrible in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word horrible you have here. The definition of the word horrible will help you to be more precise and correct when speaking or writing your texts. Knowing the definition ofhorrible, as well as those of other words, enriches your vocabulary and provides you with more and better linguistic resources.

English

Etymology

First attested in Middle English (alternately as horrible and orrible) in 1303: from Old French horrible, orrible, orible, from Latin horribilis, from horr(ēre) (“tremble”) + -ibilis (“-ible”).

Pronunciation

Noun

horrible (plural horribles)

  1. A thing that causes horror; a terrifying thing, particularly a prospective bad consequence asserted as likely to result from an act.
    • 1851 November 14, Herman Melville, Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC:
      Here's a carcase. I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I'll go to it laughing. Such a waggish leering as lurks in all your horribles!
    • 1982, United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, The Genocide Convention: Hearing Before the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate:
      A lot of the possible horribles conjured up by the people objecting to this convention ignore the plain language of this treaty.
    • 1991, Alastair Scott, Tracks Across Alaska: A Dog Sled Journey:
      The pot had previously simmered skate wings, cods' heads, whales, pigs' hearts and a long litany of other horribles.
    • 2000 January 21, John Dean, CNN interview‎:
      I'm trying to convince him that the criminal behavior that's going on at the White House has to end. And I give him one horrible after the next. I just keep raising them. He sort of swats them away.
    • 2001, Neil K. Komesar, Law's Limits: The Rule of Law and the Supply and Demand of Rights:
      Many scholars have demonstrated these horribles and contemplated significant limitations on class actions.
  2. A person wearing a comic or grotesque costume in a parade of horribles.

Translations

Adjective

horrible (comparative horribler or more horrible, superlative horriblest or most horrible)

  1. Causing horror; terrible; shocking.
    • 1892, Walter Besant, “Prologue: Who is Edmund Gray?”, in The Ivory Gate , New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, , →OCLC:
      Such a scandal as the prosecution of a brother for forgery—with a verdict of guilty—is a most truly horrible, deplorable, fatal thing. It takes the respectability out of a family perhaps at a critical moment, when the family is just assuming the robes of respectability: […] it is a black spot which all the soaps ever advertised could never wash off.
    • 1949, J. D. Salinger, The Laughing Man:
      Strangers fainted dead away at the sight of the Laughing Man's horrible face. Acquaintances shunned him.
      The New Yorker, March 19
    • 1953, Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451:
      Some of us have had plastic surgery on our faces and fingerprints. Right now we have a horrible job; we're waiting for the war to begin and, as quickly, end.
    • 1933, James Thurber, My Life and Hard Times:
      Her own mother lived the latter years of her life in the horrible suspicion that electricity was dripping invisibly all over the house.
  2. Tremendously bad.
    • 2010, Roger Ebert, Roger Ebert's Movie Yearbook 2010, page 599:
      Having now absorbed all or parts of 750 responses to my complaints about Transformers, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that most of those writing agree with me that it is a horrible movie.

Synonyms

Related terms

Translations

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1·1)
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper

Asturian

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin horribilis.

Adjective

horrible (epicene, plural horribles)

  1. horrible

Related terms

Catalan

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin horribilis.

Pronunciation

Adjective

horrible m or f (masculine and feminine plural horribles)

  1. horrible

Derived terms

Related terms

French

Etymology

Inherited from Old French horrible, orrible, orible, borrowed from Latin horribilis.

Pronunciation

Adjective

horrible (plural horribles)

  1. horrible (causing horror)

Derived terms

Related terms

Further reading

Galician

Alternative forms

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin horribilis.

Pronunciation

Adjective

horrible m or f (plural horribles)

  1. horrible

Derived terms

Related terms

Middle English

Etymology

Borrowed from Old French horrible, orrible, orible, from Latin horribilis.

Adjective

horrible

  1. horrible

Descendants

  • English: horrible

Spanish

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin horribilis.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /oˈrible/
  • Rhymes: -ible
  • Syllabification: ho‧rri‧ble

Adjective

horrible m or f (masculine and feminine plural horribles)

  1. horrible
    Synonym: desapacible

Derived terms

Related terms

Further reading

Wikious
Boobota
Sagapedia