Word.ws English Dictionary

direful

direful adjective: fearful, terrible.

Adjective

direful (comparative more direful, superlative most direful)

  1. Fearful, terrible.
    • I haue beene wooed, as I intreat thee now, / Euen by the ſterne, and direfull God of warre, / VVhoſe ſinowie necke in battel nere did bow, / VVho conquers where he comes in euery iarre; […]1594, [William Shakespeare], Venus and Adonis, 2nd edition, London: […] Richard Field, […], →OCLC, [verse 17], lines [97–100]
    • read what destiny / Or other dyrefull hap from heaven or hell / Hath wrought this wicked deed […].1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book VI, Canto XI”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC
    Synonyms:
    dire, terrible

Synonyms of direful

Forms of direful

comparativemore direful
superlativemost direful

Origin of direful

From dire + -ful.

Words formed from direful

Questions about direful

What does direful mean?
Direful means fearful, terrible.
What part of speech is direful?
Direful is an adjective.

Words near direful in the dictionary

  1. directrice
  2. directrices
  3. directrix
  4. directrixes
  5. directs
  6. direful
  7. direfully
  8. direfulness
  9. direly
  10. dirempt
  11. dirempted

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: direful (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.

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