Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Causing horror and repugnance; frightful and shocking: a gruesome murder. See Synonyms at ghastly.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Causing one to shudder; frightfully dismal or depressing; horribly repulsive.
Wiktionary
- adj. repellently frightful and shocking; horrific or ghastly
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Scot. Ugly; frightful. Same as grewsome.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. shockingly repellent; inspiring horror
Etymologies
- Compare Danish and Norwegian grusom ("horrible"), German grausam ("cruel"). (Wiktionary)
- Obsolete grue, to shudder (from Middle English gruen, from Middle Dutch grūwen or Middle Low German gruwen) + -some1. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Some Muslims have been sceptical of bin Laden's death, especially as the United States has said it will not release what it called gruesome images of his corpse for fear of inciting more violence.”
“WASHINGTON Reuters - The Obama administration wrestled on Tuesday with releasing what it called a gruesome image of Osama bin Laden's corpse, even as militants started questioning whether U.S. forces really killed him.”
“Despite being the one running around trying to save killers and judges and lawyers from being slaughtered in gruesome fashion, Nick felt like more of a villain -- albeit an impotent one -- than Clyde.”
“I don't get tired of watching heavily stereotyped teenagers get picked off in gruesome, often ironically appropriate ways.”
“Captured in gruesome detail, the Garden Zombie is made out of durable resin and comes disassembled in three gory parts.”
“NEW YORK — Members of a street gang who discovered one of their teenage recruits was gay brutally beat and tortured him and two other people in gruesome assaults, police said.”
The Huffington Post: NYPD: 7 Gang Members Brutally Tortured Gay Recruit
“The rest of the cast more or less exist to die in gruesome ways and little else.”
Flixnjoystix.com! » Valentine’s Day Comes Early!McJeffrey Reviews MY BLOODY VALENTINE 3D!
“On the sixty miles of coastal highway, Iraqi military units sit in gruesome repose, scorched skeletons of vehicles and men alike, black and awful under the sun, says the Los Angeles Times of March 11, 1991.”
When Will They Apologize to the Speicher Family? « Antiwar.com Blog
“In this game, you get to see each and every wound inflicted upon Wolverine in gruesome detail, and you can watch it heal before your eyes!”
“No sane person would be into music about killing people in gruesome ways.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘gruesome’.
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hunting
crudely, unequivocal, obsolete, obscure, overtly, misdeed, shack, inherent, outcry, hefty, composed, poised and 319 more...
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4087 more...
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LIT - Ulysses - key words and phrases
money cowrie, bedraggle, omphalos, ineluctable, postprandial, bladderwrack, modality barnacle..., loofah, shipworm, cither, embattle, Malachi and 503 more...
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Romanticism
Words to describe art of the Romantic Era
rebel, rebellious, angst, ambiguous, expression, expressionism, attitude, moody, bruisy, fantasy, dark, brooding and 91 more...
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Beautiful and Ugly
Beautiful, attractive, well-formed
Ugly, unattractive, malformedadorable, alluring, angelic, appealing, appetizing, attractive, beaming, beauteous, beautiful, becoming, beguiling, bewitching and 180 more...
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macabre
words associated with the macabre & horror.
( open list, randomness )
more:
http://www.wordnik.co...ghastly, grisly, culeus, silly, gruesome, horrid, morbid, angelic, shocking, hideous, ghoulish, frightful and 138 more...
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Morbid Curiosity: Words You Should Be...
This has the potential to be the scariest list on Wordie.
merkin, meat, shingles, vomit, goiter, incision, abattoir, erysipelas, ebola, maggot, blood, episiotomy and 51 more...
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wl1
occult, necromancy, diabolism, conjure, metaphoric, metaphor, sorcerer, legerdemain, talisman, amulet, necrophobia, deftness and 135 more...
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the first list
an immense, grandiloquent list that loads like a thousand years sentence in stone. new words are in the other lists.
ridiculous, brummagem, predicament, sanctimonious, vapid, eschew, admonish, auspicious, capitulation, enumerate, lachrymose, tenet and 1648 more...
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eggplantia5's Words
scintillate, marvel, cranberry, oscillate, triumph, bamboozle, grimace, magical, book, hexagon, cipher, compendium and 2727 more...
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Personal Vocabulary List
All my favourite words that I come across!
veritable, incongruence, rigamorole, letcherous, revolting, repulsive, reputrid, rapatious, forays, guise, placate, paradigm and 1162 more...
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SoSheShall's list
slurp, coeur, slurple, glop, perp, fluarxx, ropechno, herrherr, burrduhherrherr, sloppy, cheezie balls, eccentric and 634 more...
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The Sog Collection
My big word list.
chaos, flaccid, empirical, flotsam, cacophony, grumble, assuage, awe, romance, mortality, coalesce, fortuitous and 3282 more...
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Miss Sunshine
she's such a joy.
bereaved, bitter, cheerless, dejected, depressed, despairing, despondent, disconsolate, dismal, distressed, doleful, downcast and 405 more...
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out of interest
lithesome, wholesome, gruesome, tiresome, worrisome, cumbersome, lonesome, loathsome, burdensome, fearsome, wearisome, irksome and 97 more...
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Unusual and Random Words
My Favourite Kind
quagmire, soliloquy, aardvark, topaz, ardent, exquisite, pyromania, pyre, extravagant, obscure, quetzal, quibble and 199 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for gruesome.
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