different between menacing vs barbarous

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?m?n?s??/
• Hyphenation: men?acing

Adjective

menacing (comparative more menacing, superlative most menacing)

1. Suggesting imminent harm.
2. Threatening.

Translations

Verb

menacing

1. present participle of menace

Translations

Noun

menacing (plural menacings)

1. The act of making menaces or threats.
   • 1824-1826, William Cobbett, History of the Protestant Reformation

     They remember his subornings, menacings, bribings, cuttings, maimings, hangings, and burnings.

English

Alternative forms

• (obsolete) barbarouse

Etymology

Late Middle English, from Latin barbarus (“foreigner, savage”), from Ancient Greek ???????? (bárbaros, “foreign, strange”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?b??(?)b???s/

Adjective

barbarous (comparative more barbarous, superlative most barbarous)

1. (said of language) Not classical or pure.
2. uncivilized, uncultured
   • 1923, Walter de la Mare, Seaton's Aunt

     I felt vaguely he was a sneak, and remained quite unmollified by advances on his side, which, in a boy's barbarous fashion, unless it suited me to be magnanimous, I haughtily ignored.

3. Like a barbarian, especially in sound; noisy, dissonant.

   I did but prompt the age to quit their cloggs

   By the known rules of antient libertie,

   When strait a barbarous noise environs me

   Of Owles and Cuckoes, Asses, Apes and Doggs - I did but prompt the age to quit their cloggs, John Milton (1673)

Derived terms

• barbarously
• barbarousness

Related terms

• barbarian
• barbaric

Translations