Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Of, resembling, or worthy of hell; fiendish.
  • adjective Highly unpleasant.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Pertaining to hell; fit for or like hell; infernal; malignant; wicked.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Of or pertaining to hell; like hell; infernal; malignant; wicked; detestable; diabolical.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Causing pain, discomfort or distress.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective very unpleasant
  • adjective extremely evil or cruel; expressive of cruelty or befitting hell

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

hell +‎ -ish

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Examples

  • CALLEBS: CNN military analyst, retired General James "Spider" Marks said the president detailed how Iraq plunged into what he calls hellish chaos.

    CNN Transcript Jan 24, 2007 2007

  • CALLEBS: CNN military analyst, Retired General James "Spider" Marks, said the president detailed how Iraq plunged into what he calls hellish chaos.

    CNN Transcript Jan 24, 2007 2007

  • CALLEBS: CNN military analyst Retired General James "Spider" Marks said the president detailed how Iraq plunged into what he calls hellish chaos.

    CNN Transcript Jan 24, 2007 2007

  • Army holding cell, the first stop in what he described as a hellish four-month journey through the U.S. military prison system in Iraq.

    Hullabaloo 2004

  • Army holding cell, the first stop in what he described as a hellish four-month journey through the U.S. military prison system in Iraq.

    Hullabaloo 2004

  • Diaz saw when he went up the Mexican teocalli with Cortes, and which he describes as a hellish instrument, made with skins of great serpents; and which, when it was struck, gave a loud and melancholy sound, that could be heard at two leagues 'distance.

    Anahuac : or, Mexico and the Mexicans, Ancient and Modern Edward Burnett Tylor

  • The Marianas actually had a labor shortage, and had to import workers, and yet they were still working in hellish conditions.

    Matthew Yglesias » The Limits of “No” 2009

  • Rather than serving time in hellish Tent City, Arpaio allows his special guests to serve their sentences in private, climate-controlled cells at the Mesa Hilton.

    Coyote Blog » Blog Archive » More Crazy Joe Arpaio Sh*t 2009

  • So Re 16: 10, "the seat (rather, throne) of the beasts," in hellish parody of God's throne. four and twenty elders -- Greek, "the four and twenty (or as one oldest manuscript, 'twenty-four') elders": the well-known elders [Alford].

    Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible 1871

  • When our Heaven-favored nation was assaulted, and eight millions of her subjects, armed from her own armories, rose in hellish purpose to slay her, and unknown thousands through all our midst stood ready to her burial, Abraham Lincoln was called to her defence.

    A Discourse Delivered on the Occasion of the Funeral Obsequies of President Lincoln 1865

Comments

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  • Not quite the same as hellacious.

    p.s. Is this like sorryish?

    October 19, 2007

  • Wouldn't hellish be sort of purgatoryish by its very nature? Discuss.

    October 19, 2007