horrid

See also: hòrrid

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin horridus (“rough, bristly, savage, shaggy, rude”), from horrere (“to bristle”). See horrent, horror, ordure.

Pronunciation

  • (UK) IPA(key): /ˈhɒ.ɹɪd/
    • Audio (UK):(file)
  • (General American) IPA(key): /ˈhɔ.ɹɪd/
  • (New York City, Philadelphia) IPA(key): /ˈhɑ.ɹɪd/
  • Rhymes: -ɒɹɪd
  • Hyphenation: hor‧rid

Adjective

horrid (comparative horrider or more horrid, superlative horridest or most horrid)

  1. (archaic) Bristling, rough, rugged.
    • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto VII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 31:
      His haughtie Helmet, horrid all with gold, // Both glorious brightnesse and great terror bredd.
    • 1634 October 9 (first performance), [John Milton], edited by H[enry] Lawes, A Maske Presented at Ludlow Castle, 1634: […] [Comus], London: […] [Augustine Matthews] for Hvmphrey Robinson, […], published 1637, →OCLC; reprinted as Comus: […] (Dodd, Mead & Company’s Facsimile Reprints of Rare Books; Literature Series; no. I), New York, N.Y.: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1903, →OCLC:
      Yea there, where very Desolation dwells, / By grots and caverns shagg'd with horrid shades, / She may pass on with unblench'd majesty, / Be it not done in pride, or in presumption.
    • 1697, Virgil, “The Ninth Book of the Æneis”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:
      Horrid with fern, and intricate with thorn, / Few paths of human feet, or tracks of beasts, were worn.
  2. Causing horror or dread.
    Synonyms: see Thesaurus:frightening
  3. Offensive, disagreeable, abominable, execrable.
    horrid weather
    The other girls in class are always horrid to Jane.
    • 1628, William Prynne, The Vnlouelinesse, of Louelockes. Or, A Summarie Discourse, Proouing: The Wearing, and Nourishing of a Locke, or Loue-locke, to be Altogether Vnseemely, and Vnlawfull unto Christians. […], London: [s.n.], →OCLC, page 1:
      [T]hoſe Laſciuious, Immodeſt, VVhoriſh, or vngodly Faſhions, and Attires, vvhich Metamorphiſe, and Transforme, our Light, and Giddie Females of the Superior and Gentile ranke, into ſundry Antique, Horred, and Out-landiſh ſhapes, from day, to day: […]
    • 1668 November 2 (date written; Gregorian calendar), Samuel Pepys, Mynors Bright, transcriber, “October 23rd, 1668”, in Henry B[enjamin] Wheatley, editor, The Diary of Samuel Pepys […], volume VIII, London: George Bell & Sons […]; Cambridge: Deighton Bell & Co., published 1896, →OCLC:
      My Lord Chief Justice Keeling hath laid the constable by the heels to answer it next Sessions: which is a horrid shame.
    • 1697, William Dampier, A New Voyage Round the World. […], London: […] James Knapton, […], →OCLC, page 362:
      About the middle of November we began to work on our Ship's bottom, which we found very much eaten with the Worm: For this is a horrid place for Worms.
    • 1712 May, [Alexander Pope], “The Rape of the Locke. An Heroi-comical Poem.”, in Miscellaneous Poems and Translations. […], London: […] Bernard Lintott […], →OCLC, canto IV:
      Methinks already I your tears survey, / Already hear the horrid things they say,

Usage notes

  • According to OED, horrid and horrible were originally almost synonymous, but in modern use horrid is somewhat less strong and tending towards the "offensive, disagreeable" sense.[1]

Synonyms

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Derived terms

Translations

Adverb

horrid (not comparable)

  1. Terribly; horridly; to an extreme extent.
    • 1889, Rudyard Kipling, “Only A Subaltern”, in Under the Deodars, Boston: The Greenock Press, published 1899, page 149:
      “Beg y’ pardon, sir,” said a voice at the tent door; “but Dormer’s ’orrid bad, sir, an’ they’ve taken him orf, sir.”

References

  1. ^ [1]

Further reading

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