DREAD • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Dread

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/drɛd/ Listen

noun

Dread n.

Great fear in view of impending evil; fearful apprehension of danger; anticipatory terror. "The secret dread of divine displeasure." "The dread of something after death."

Reverential or respectful fear; awe. "The fear of you, and the dread of you, shall be upon every beast of the earth." "His scepter shows the force of temporal power, The attribute to awe and majesty, Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings."

An object of terrified apprehension.

A person highly revered. (Obs.) "Una, his dear dread."

Fury; dreadfulness. (Obs.)

Doubt; as, out of dread. (Obs.)

Synonyms: Awe; fear; affright; terror; horror; dismay; apprehension. See Reverence.

verb

Dread v. t. (past & past part. dreaded; pres. part. dreading) To fear in a great degree; to regard, or look forward to, with terrific apprehension. "When at length the moment dreaded through so many years came close, the dark cloud passed away from Johnson's mind."

Dread v. i. To be in dread, or great fear. "Dread not, neither be afraid of them."

adjective

Dread adj.

Exciting great fear or apprehension; causing terror; frightful; dreadful. "A dread eternity! how surely mine."

Inspiring with reverential fear; awful' venerable; as, dread sovereign; dread majesty; dread tribunal.

See images of 'Dread'

Etymology of 'Dread'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar

"Dread" Quotes from Famous Books

... now, as she lay there in her bed, her whole soul was occupied with thoughts of that little party of people—some of them so well known to her—all of them sent out upon this perilous and frightful expedition by her consent and assistance, and now left alone to work their way through the dread and silent waters that underlie the awful ice regions of the pole. She felt that so long as she had a mind she could not help thinking of them, and so long as she thought of them she could ...

— The Great Stone of Sardis • Frank R. Stockton

... was risking the salvation of my soul, afraid that I might be endangering other people whom I might influence, never free to study the Bible, to study religious questions as I would study any other matter on the face of the earth on account of being haunted by this terrible dread? ...

— Our Unitarian Gospel • Minot Savage

... whose head Calm days have flown and closed the sixtieth year, Back on this flight he looks and feels no dread To think that Lethe's waters flow so near. There is no day of all the train that gives A pang; no moment that he would forget. A good man's span is doubled; twice he lives Who, viewing his ...

— A Williams Anthology - A Collection of the Verse and Prose of Williams College, 1798-1910 • Compiled by Edwin Partridge Lehman and Julian Park

... High sees meet to vouchsafe to our endeavours. May this success not fail you, and may your outward life leave you unhurt by the storms to which the sad heart so often looks forward with a shrinking dread.' ...

— Queen Victoria • Anonymous

... an anteroom, and in due time Mr. Wilbur was called into the dread presence. He was somewhat nervous and agitated, but "braced up," as he afterward expressed it, and went in. He wanted Phil to go in with him, but the attendant said that madam would not allow it, and ...

— The Errand Boy • Horatio Alger

More quotes...