Word.ws English Dictionary

scatheful

scatheful adjective: causing harm or mischief; destructive, injurious.

Adjective

scatheful (comparative more scatheful, superlative most scatheful)

  1. (archaic) Causing harm or mischief; destructive, injurious.
    • A bawbling Veſſell was he Captaine of,
      For ſhallow draught and bulke vnprizable,
      With which ſuch ſcathfull grapple did he make,
      With the moſt noble bottome of our Fleete,
      That very enuy, and the tongue of loſſe
      Cride fame and honor on him: What's the matter?c. 1601–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Twelfe Night, or What You Will”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...
    Synonyms:
    harmful

Synonyms of scatheful

Forms of scatheful

comparativemore scatheful
superlativemost scatheful
alternative formscathful
alternative form (obsolete)scadeful

Origin of scatheful

From Middle English *scatheful (attested in derivative unnskaþefull) equivalent to scathe + -ful. Cognate with Scots scathfull, scaithful (“harmful, hurtful, injurious, damaging”).

Words formed from scatheful

Questions about scatheful

What does scatheful mean?
Scatheful means causing harm or mischief; destructive, injurious.
What part of speech is scatheful?
Scatheful is an adjective.

Words near scatheful in the dictionary

  1. scathead
  2. scatheads
  3. scathed
  4. scathefire
  5. scathefires
  6. scatheful
  7. scathefulness
  8. scatheless
  9. scathelessly
  10. scathelessness
  11. scathely

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: scatheful (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:

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