Word
horrendous
Phoneticshor·ren·dous
US/ˌhɔˈɹɛndəs/
UK/hɒɹˈɛndəs/
Definition
adj. extremely bad, unpleasant, or shocking. You use it to describe something that is very difficult to deal with or look at.
adj. extremely unpleasant, horrifying, or terrible in quality. Often used to describe sensory experiences, situations, or statistics that are exceptionally negative.
Examples
“The traffic on the way to work was horrendous.”
“The victims of the storm described the horrendous conditions they faced while waiting for rescue teams to arrive.”
“The report detailed the horrendous living conditions in the overcrowded refugee camps, urging immediate international intervention to prevent a humanitarian disaster.”
Examples
simple
“The traffic on the way to work was horrendous.”
contextual
“The victims of the storm described the horrendous conditions they faced while waiting for rescue teams to arrive.”
complex
“The report detailed the horrendous living conditions in the overcrowded refugee camps, urging immediate international intervention to prevent a humanitarian disaster.”
Usage
Typically used as a gradable adjective; frequently modified by intensifiers like 'absolutely' or 'truly'.
Real-World Examples
“They are so wonderful, that we can do such horrendous things to animals is beyond belief.” “Everything trundles along fine, and then something really horrendous happens and then you have to take a policy position.” Etymology
Borrowed from Latin horrendus, future passive participle (gerundive) of horreō (“I dread”) + -ous.
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Scan code
englishreference.com/q/horrendous