different between awfulness vs anguish

English

Etymology

From Middle English aghfulnesse, equivalent to awful +? -ness.

Noun

awfulness (usually uncountable, plural awfulnesses)

1. The state or quality of being awful.
   • 1942, Emily Carr, The Book of Small, "Characters," [1]

     Out came old Teenie, buzzing mad as a whole nest of wasps. Muttered awfulnesses came from her great padded bonnet.

   • 1961, Peter De Vries, The Blood of the Lamb, Penguin, 1982, Chapter 3, p. 36,

     "Why is the awfulness of families such a popular reason for starting another?"

2. The quality of striking with awe, or with reverence

   Synonyms: dreadfulness, solemnity

   • 1823, Thomas de Quincey, "On the Knocking at the Gate in Macbeth" in On Murder, edited by Robert Morrison, Oxford World's Classics, 2006, p. 3,

     […] the knocking at the gate, which succeeds to the murder of Duncan, produced to my feelings an effect for which I could never account: the effect was—that it reflected back upon the murder a peculiar awfulness and a depth of solemnity […]

   the awfulness of this sacred place

3. The state of being struck with awe; a spirit of solemnity; profound reverence.

English

Pronunciation

• enPR: ?ng?-gw?sh, IPA^(key): /?æ?.?w??/

Etymology 1

From Middle English angwissh, anguishe, angoise, from Anglo-Norman anguise, anguisse, from Old French angoisse, from Latin angustia (“narrowness, scarcity, difficulty, distress”), from angustus (“narrow, difficult”), from angere (“to press together, cause pain, distress”). See angst, the Germanic cognate, and anger.

Noun

anguish (countable and uncountable, plural anguishes)

1. Extreme pain, either of body or mind; excruciating distress.
   • 1549, Hugh Latimer, "The Third Sermon Preached before King Edward VI:

     So, ye miserable people; you must go to God in anguishes, and make your prayer to him.

   • 1595/96, William Shakespeare, A Midsummer's Night Dream, Act V, sc. 1:

     Is there no play,

     To ease the anguish of a torturing hour?

   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, Fairie Queene, Book I, LIII:

     Love of your selfe, she saide, and deare constraint,

     Lets me not sleepe, but wast the wearie night

     In secret anguish and unpittied plaint,

     Whiles you in carelesse sleepe are drowned quight.

   • 1611, King James Version, Exodus 6:9:

     But they hearkened not unto Moses for anguish of spirit, and for cruel bondage.

   • 1700, John Dryden, Fables, Ancient and Modern, "Cinyras and Myrrha":

     There, loathing Life, and yet of Death afraid,

     In Anguish of her Spirit, thus she pray'd.

   • 1708, John Philips, Cyder, A Poem in Two Books, Book I:

     May I the sacred pleasures know

     Of strictest amity, nor ever want

     A friend with whom I mutually may share

     Gladness and anguish ...

   • 1848, William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair, Chapter 18:

     She took his trembling hand, and kissed it, and put it round her neck: she called him her John—her dear John—her old man—her kind old man; she poured out a hundred words of incoherent love and tenderness; her faithful voice and simple caresses wrought this sad heart up to an inexpressible delight and anguish, and cheered and solaced his over-burdened soul.

   • 1892, Walt Whitman, The Leaves of Grass, "Old War-Dreams":

     In midnight sleep of many a face of anguish,

     Of the look at first of the mortally wounded, (of that indescribable

     look,)

     Of the dead on their backs with arms extended wide,

     I dream, I dream, I dream.

   Synonyms: agony, calvary, cross, pang, torture, torment; see also Thesaurus:agony

Related terms

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English angwischen, anguis(s)en, from Old French angoissier, anguissier, from the noun (see Etymology 1).

Verb

anguish (third-person singular simple present anguishes, present participle anguishing, simple past and past participle anguished)

1. (intransitive) To suffer pain.
   • c. 1900s, Kl. Knigge, Iceland Folk Song, traditional, Harmony: H. Ruland

     We’re leaving these shores for our time has come, the days of our youth must now end. The hearts bitter anguish, it burns for the home that we’ll never see again.

2. (transitive) To cause to suffer pain.

Translations

References

Further reading

• anguish in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• anguish in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.