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19 wrz 2024 · terrible (adj.) c. 1400, "causing terror; that excites or is fitted to excite awe or dread; frightful; unendurable," from Old French terrible (12c.) and directly from Latin terribilis "frightful," from terrere "fill with fear."
Both terrible and terrific go back, through French and Latin to Proto Indo European roots meaning to shiver. The origin is self explanatory: extreme fear being well known to provoke shivering. To these two you can therefore add tremor and tremble. In English "terrible" and "terrific" are antonyms.
4 lut 2013 · Biblical and theological texts forsooth refer to Christian god as “great and terrible” with frequency, but I do think the meaning is literal: “God is great, and should be revered, but he is also terrible, thus he should be feared”.
27 wrz 2024 · Dreadful; causing terror, alarm and fear; awesome. The witch laid a terrible curse on him. 1950, C. S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: People who have not been in Narnia sometimes think that a thing cannot be good and terrible at the same time.
The earliest known use of the word terrible is in the Middle English period (1150—1500). OED's earliest evidence for terrible is from around 1400, in Aelred of Rievaulx's De Institutione Inclusarum.
28 wrz 2017 · horribile dictu. Latin, "horrible to say, dreadful to relate," from neuter of horribilis (see horrible) + ablative supine of dicere "to say, speak" (from PIE root *deik- "to show," also "pronounce solemnly"). horribly (adv.) mid-14c., from horrible + -ly (2).
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