fraught

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Definitions (14)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (3)

  1. adjective Filled with a specified element or elements; charged: an incident fraught with danger; an evening fraught with high drama.
  2. adjective Marked by or causing distress; emotional: "an account of a fraught mother-daughter relationship” (Francesca Simon).
  3. noun Scots Freight; cargo.

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Examples

  • To every work he brought a memory full fraught, together with a fancy fertile of original combinations and at once exerted the powers of the scholar, the reasoner, and the wit. —  Lives of the English Poets: Prior, Congreve, Blackmore, Pope
  • The day had been fraught, and their trail had been picked up by a second band of Aenir foresters. —  The Hawk Eternal
  • Alison would sometimes catch a glimpse of him when things were getting fraught, and he'd have this small, private little smile about the corners of his mouth that suggested not mere content, but that he might actually be getting off on it. —  Be My Enemy
  • But when he listened to her frank admission--fraught, as it seemed to him, with more meaning than the mere naked words would, of themselves, imply, an angry flush of new-born jealousy overspread his features Ha! —  Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 Devoted to Literature and National Policy
  • With various stores of erudition fraught, —  Life Of Johnson
 

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Fraught has been looked up 353 times, favorited 3 times, listed 45 times, and commented on 27 times.

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Etymologies (3)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English, past participle of fraughten, to load, from fraght, cargo; see freight, and from Middle Dutch vrachten, to load (from vracht, freight; see aik- in Indo-European roots).

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (2)

  1. from Middle English fraught, frauʒt, fragt, a load, cargo, freight, freight-money (in this sense with a variant freight, freyt, freythe: see quot. under def. 2), from Dutch vracht = Middle Low German vrucht, vrecht, vracht, Low German, fracht (later G. fracht = Danish fragt = Swedish frakt), a load, cargo, freight, apparently orig. the freight-money, = Old High German frēht, gain, profit, reward ( later gi-frēhtōn, earn, gain), prob. = Gothic (Moesogothic) as if *fra-aihts from fra- = Old High German far-, fir- = Anglo-Saxon for-, English for-, + Gothic (Moesogothic) aihts = Old High German ēht = Anglo-Saxon ǣht, property, possessions, literally what is owned, from Gothic (Moesogothic) aigan = Anglo-Saxon āgan, have, own: see owe, own. From the Low German come Old French frait, fret, French fret = Portuguese frete = Spanish flete (Middle Latin frecta, fretta), freight, freightage, to which is due the change of vowel, from fraught to late Middle English and modern English freight: see freight.
  2. from Middle English fraughten, frauʒten, rare except in the past participle fraught, which remains the most common form (in the fig. sense) in modern English; = Dutch be-vrachten = Middle Low German vrachten = German frachten, from Danish fragte = Swedish frakta, lade, load, fraught; from the noun.
 

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/frɔt/
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