different between terrific vs gruesome

English

Alternative forms

• terrifick (obsolete)

Etymology

From French terrifique, and its source, Latin terrificus (“terrifying”), from terrere (“to frighten, terrify”) + -ficus, from facere (“to make”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /t????f?k/
• Rhymes: -?f?k

Adjective

terrific (comparative more terrific, superlative most terrific)

1. (now rare) Terrifying, causing terror; terrible; sublime, awe-inspiring. [from 17th c.]

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:frightening

   • 1796–7, Mary Wollstonecraft, The Wrongs of Woman, Oxford 2009, p. 83:

     [T]he dismal shrieks of demoniac rage […] roused phantoms of horror in her mind, far more terrific than all that dreaming superstition ever drew.

   • 1821, Charles Maturin, Melmoth the Wanderer, volume 2, page 154:

     Think of wandering amid sepulchral ruins, of stumbling over the bones of the dead, of encountering what I cannot describe,—the horror of being among those who are neither the living or the dead;—those dark and shadowless things that sport themselves with the reliques of the dead, and feast and love amid corruption,—ghastly, mocking, and terrific.
2. Very strong or intense; excessive, tremendous. [from 18th c.]

   The car came round the bend at a terrific speed.

   I've got a terrific hangover this morning.
3. Extremely good; excellent, amazing. [from 19th c.]

   I say! She's a terrific tennis player.

Synonyms

• brilliant
• horrific

Related terms

• terrible
• terrify
• terrifying
• terror
• terrorist
• terrorize

Translations

Further reading

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

Anagrams

• ferritic

English

Etymology

From grue (“to shudder”) +? -some. Compare Danish and Norwegian grusom (“horrible”), German grausam (“cruel”), and Dutch gruwzaam (“gruesome; cruel”).

Adjective

gruesome (comparative gruesomer or more gruesome, superlative gruesomest or most gruesome)

1. Repellently frightful and shocking; horrific or ghastly.
   • 1912: Edgar Rice Burroughs, Tarzan of the Apes, Chapter 6

     In the middle of the floor lay a skeleton, every vestige of flesh gone from the bones to which still clung the mildewed and moldered remnants of what had once been clothing. Upon the bed lay a similar gruesome thing, but smaller, while in a tiny cradle near-by was a third, a wee mite of a skeleton.

Translations