different between difficult vs dire

English

Etymology

From Middle English difficult (ca. 1400), a back-formation from difficultee (whence modern difficulty), from Old French difficulté, from Latin difficultas, from difficul, older form of difficilis (“hard to do, difficult”), from dis- + facilis (“easy”); see difficile. Replaced native Middle English earveþ (“difficult, hard”), from Old English earfoþe (“difficult, laborious, full of hardship”), cognate to German Arbeit (“work”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?d?f?k?lt/

Adjective

difficult (comparative difficulter or more difficult, superlative difficultest or most difficult)

1. Hard, not easy, requiring much effort.

   However, the difficult weather conditions will ensure Yunnan has plenty of freshwater.

   • There is not the strength or courage left me to venture into the wide, strange, difficult world, alone.
2. (often of a person, or a horse, etc) Hard to manage, uncooperative, troublesome.

3. (obsolete) Unable or unwilling.

Usage notes

Difficult implies that considerable mental effort or physical skill is required, or that obstacles are to be overcome which call for sagacity and skill in the doer; as, a difficult task. Thus, "hard" is not always synonymous with difficult. Examples include a difficult operation in surgery and a difficult passage by an author (that is, a passage which is hard to understand).

Synonyms

• burdensome, cumbersome, hard
• see also Thesaurus:difficult

Derived terms

• difficultly

Translations

Verb

difficult (third-person singular simple present difficults, present participle difficulting, simple past and past participle difficulted)

1. (obsolete, transitive) To make difficult; to impede; to perplex.
   • August 9 1678, William Temple, letter to Joseph Williamson

     their Excellencies having desisted from their pretensions , which had difficulted the peace

Further reading

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

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin d?rus (“fearful, ominous”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?da???(?)/
• Rhymes: -a??(?)

Adjective

dire (comparative direr or more dire, superlative direst or most dire)

1. Warning of bad consequences: ill-boding; portentous.

2. Requiring action to prevent bad consequences: urgent, pressing.
3. Expressing bad consequences: dreadful; dismal

   Synonyms: horrible, terrible, lamentable

4. (informal) Bad in quality, awful, terrible.

   His dire mistake allowed her to checkmate him with her next move.

Quotations

• For quotations using this term, see Citations:dire.

Derived terms

Translations

See also

• voir dire

Anagrams

• Dier, IDer, Reid, dier, drie, ired, ride

French

Etymology

From Middle French dire, from Old French dire, from Latin d?c?, from Proto-Italic *deik?, from Proto-Indo-European *déy?ti (“to show, point out”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /di?/
• (Quebec) IPA^(key): /d?zi?/
• Rhymes: -i?

Verb

dire

1. to say, to tell
2. (informal) (transitive with à) to be of interest to someone, to interest someone

3. (informal) (transitive with à) to sound familiar

Conjugation

Derived terms

Related terms

• diction
• indicible

Noun

dire m (plural dires)

1. saying (that which is said)
2. belief, opinion

Derived terms

• aux dires de

Further reading

• “dire” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Anagrams

• ride, ridé

Italian

Alternative forms

• dicere (archaic)

Etymology

From a contraction of Latin d?cere, present active infinitive of d?c?, from Proto-Italic *deik?, from Proto-Indo-European *déy?ti (“to show, point out”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?di.re/
• Hyphenation: dì?re

Verb

dìre (first-person singular present dìco, first-person singular past historic dìssi, past participle détto, first-person singular imperfect dicévo, second-person singular imperative di' or (with written accent) dì, auxiliary avere) (transitive)

1. to say, tell
2. to recite
3. to mean
4. to think
5. to admit

Conjugation

Related terms

Anagrams

• ride

Latin

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /?di?.re/, [?d?i???]
• (Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /?di.re/, [?d?i???]

Adjective

d?re

1. vocative masculine singular of d?rus

References

• dire in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898) Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers

Middle French

Etymology

From Old French dire, from a contraction of Latin d?cere, present active infinitive of d?c?.

Verb

dire

1. to say (express using language)

Descendants

• French: dire

Occitan

Alternative forms

• díder, díser

Etymology

From Old Occitan dir, dire, from a contraction of Latin d?cere, present active infinitive of d?c?.

Verb

dire

1. to say (express using language)
2. to mean; to signify

Conjugation

Old French

Etymology

From a contraction of Latin d?cere, present active infinitive of d?c?.

Verb

dire

1. (chiefly intransitive) to say
2. (transitive) to recount (a story)

Conjugation

This verb conjugates as a third-group verb. This verb has irregularities in its conjugation. Old French conjugation varies significantly by date and by region. The following conjugation should be treated as a guide.

Descendants

• Middle French: dire
  • French: dire
• Norman: dithe
• Walloon: dire

References

• “Appendix E: Irregular Verbs” in E. Einhorn (1974), Old French: A Concise Handbook, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, ?ISBN, page 153

Old Occitan

Alternative forms

• dir

Etymology

From a contraction of Latin d?cere, present active infinitive of d?c?.

Verb

dire

1. to say

Descendants

• Occitan: dire

Walloon

Etymology

From Old French dire, from a contraction of Latin d?c?, d?cere.

Verb

dire

1. to say