bereaved
/bɪˈɹiːvd/
bereaved adjective: having suffered the death of a loved one. Also the simple past and past participle of bereave.
Adjective
bereaved (comparative more bereaved, superlative most bereaved)
- Having suffered the death of a loved one.
- bereaved relatives
- With ironic deference, Brodie takes out the record from the gym bag. “Look, I was sorry to hear about your dad.”
Luisa nods, feels grief rise and her defenses stiffen. “Yeah.”
“I guess it was . . . a release, of sorts.”
True, but only the bereaved can actually say so.2004, David Mitchell, “Half-Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery”, in Cloud Atlas, →ISBN, page 121
- Synonyms:
- distraught, griefful, grief-struck, heartsore, mournful, agonised/agonized, tormented, tortured
Also used as
bereaved is also the simple past and past participle of bereave.
Synonyms of bereaved
- distraught
- griefful
- grief-struck
- heartsore
- mournful
- agonised/agonized
- tormented
- tortured
- bereft
Forms of bereaved
| comparative | more bereaved |
|---|---|
| superlative | most bereaved |
Words formed from bereaved
Questions about bereaved
- What does bereaved mean?
- Bereaved means having suffered the death of a loved one.
- What part of speech is bereaved?
- Bereaved is an adjective.
- How do you pronounce bereaved?
- Bereaved is pronounced /bɪˈɹiːvd/.
Words near bereaved in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: bereaved (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-bereaved.wav.
Cite this entry: “bereaved.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/bereaved. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.