Word.ws English Dictionary

dreadly

dreadly adjective: dreadful.

Adjective

dreadly (comparative more dreadly, superlative most dreadly)

  1. (obsolete) dreadful
    • At thy approach, black shades did vanish, / And from my heart thou feare didst banish, / And in their room did light appear, / And joy instead of dreadly feare.1652, Anonymous, "Christs Kingdome" in Eliza's Babes, Or, The Virgin's Offering, critical edition by L. E. Semler, Associated University Press, 2001, p. 73, lines 16-20...
    • […] To distant climes, a dreadly scene, / Where half the convex world intrudes between, / To torrid tracts with fainting steps they go, / Where wild Altama murmurs to their woe.1770, Oliver Goldsmith, The Deserted Village, in The Poetical Works of Dr. Goldsmith, London: J. Osborne & T. Griffin, 1785, p. 44...

Adverb

dreadly (comparative more dreadly, superlative most dreadly)

  1. (obsolete) With dread.
    • So shall you see a Cloud-crown'd Hill somtime, / Torn from a greater by the waste of Time; / Dreadly to shake, and boundling down to hop, / And roaring, here it roules tall Cedars up;1641, Du Bartas His Diuine Weekes And Workes, translated by Josuah Sylvester, London: Robert Young, "The Captains. The Fourth Part of the Third Day of the II. Week," p. 181...
    • […] when high in Air / The chos'n Archangel rides, whose right hand weilds / Th'imperial standard of heav'n's providence, / Which dreadly sweeping thro' the vaulted sky / O'ershadows all creation.1752, William Mason, Elfrida: A Dramatic Poem, London: John Knapton, published 1757, page 54

Examples of dreadly in a sentence

  • 'mid the dreadly solitude a pilgrim form I see / Swift gliding towards me—1860, W. Charles Kent, “Infinitude (from Schiller)”, in The New Monthly Magazine, volume 119, London: Chapman & Hall, page 88:
  • 'The teeth of the dreadly viper is still sticking into me!' he yelled.1982, Roald Dahl, The BFG, Penguin UK, published 2007:
  • Some practices are considered as essential for the attainment of an enlightened life but are looked upon as dreadly or extremely secret.1992, Kāmarūpa Anusandhān Samiti, The Journal of the Assam Research Society, page 12:
  • The Normans made another dreadly appearance in 869, and as they were pagans they had no compunction about attacking, plundering and setting fire to the abbey of Saint-Germain-de-Prés.2006, Jean-Denis G. G. Lepage, chapter 6, in The Fortifications of Paris, McFarland, page 25:

Forms of dreadly

Adjective
comparativemore dreadly
superlativemost dreadly
Adverb
comparativemore dreadly
superlativemost dreadly

Origin of dreadly

From Middle English dredli, dredlich, dredlyche, dredeliche, equivalent to dread + -ly.

From Middle English dredly, dredliche, equivalent to dread + -ly.

Questions about dreadly

What does dreadly mean?
Dreadly means dreadful.
How do you use dreadly in a sentence?
'mid the dreadly solitude a pilgrim form I see / Swift gliding towards me—
What part of speech is dreadly?
Dreadly can be an adjective or an adverb.

Words near dreadly in the dictionary

  1. dreadlessness
  2. dreadlock
  3. dreadlocked
  4. dreadlocking
  5. dreadlocks
  6. dreadly
  7. dreadmill
  8. dreadmills
  9. dreadnaught
  10. dreadnaughts
  11. dreadness

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: dreadly (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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Cite this entry: “dreadly.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/dreadly. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.