Awful Meaning
/ˈɔːfʊl/Definition, CEFR level A2, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
Listen pronunciation
Definition
adjVery bad.
adjExceedingly great; usually applied intensively.
Sentence Examples
I'm afraid there's been some awful news.
It's an awful shame your wife couldn't come.
The rooms were awful and the food was worse.
CEFR Practice Quiz
The spoiled milk had an ____ smell that filled the kitchen.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
I had an ____ headache all day today and could not focus on my work.
Word Origin & History
From Middle English agheful, awfull, auful, aȝefull, equivalent to awe + -ful. Compare Old English eġeful, eġefull (“terrifying; awful”). The “very bad” sense is a pejorative semantic shift from the original sense of “awe-inspiring”.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"Shepard: You seem to know an awful lot about me.
Geth: Extranet data sources. Insecure broadcasts. All organic data sent out is received. We watch you."
— 2010, BioWare, Mass Effect 2 (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →OCLC, PC, scene: Normandy SR-2 AI Core Room:
"There was an air of gravity and importance about the garb of the person, and something indescribably odd, I might say awful, in the perfect, stonelike stillness of the figure, that effectually checked the testy comment which had at once risen to the lips of the irritated artist."
— 1839, J. Sheridan Le Fanu, Schalken the Painter:
"At our old pastimes in the hall
We gambol’d, making vain pretence
Of gladness, with an awful sense
Of one mute Shadow watching all."
— 1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], “Canto XXX”, in In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 48:
"As I am seen could I but gaze on Thee / Awful in majesty and royal might"
— 1889, Harriet McEwen Kimball, Poems, "Omniscience":
"God ought not to be commixed in our actions, but with awful reverence, and an attention full of honour and respect."
— 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 56, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book I, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:
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CEFR Practice Quiz
The spoiled milk had an ____ smell that filled the kitchen.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
I had an ____ headache all day today and could not focus on my work.