unholy
Americanadjective
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not holy; not sacred or hallowed.
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impious; sinful; wicked.
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Informal. dreadful; ungodly.
They got us out of bed at the unholy hour of three in the morning.
adjective
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not holy or sacred
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immoral or depraved
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informal outrageous or unnatural
an unholy alliance
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of unholy
before 1000; Middle English; Old English unhālig (cognate with Dutch onheilig, Old Norse ūheilagr ). See un- 1, holy
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
The noise, according to singer Katie Gavin, was like an unholy screech.
From BBC ● Jul. 24, 2026
A God’s-eye view captures sparks and flames tearing a circle around his unholy play.
From Salon ● Jan. 23, 2026
Now one of Egypt's most sacred places - revered by Jews, Christians and Muslims - is at the heart of an unholy row over plans to turn it into a new tourism mega-project.
From BBC ● Sep. 6, 2025
These are images that evoke nature as a force at apparent odds with fashion, holy vs. unholy.
From Slate ● Jul. 21, 2025
It burned with an unholy dripping glare for a minute, three times normal size, then dwindled.
From "The Martian Chronicles" by Ray Bradbury
But last week in Mexico, where Maciel founded the ultraconservative Legion in 1941, the scandal took an even unholier turn.
From Time ● Mar. 8, 2010
But nightclub owners had unholier reasons to cry into their champagne last week.
From Time Magazine Archive
Nay, Margaret, I doubt not my thoughts have been far unholier than thine.
From In Convent Walls The Story of the Despensers by Irwin, M. (Madelaine)
Eastman, the New Yorker from Ithaca who died in 1990 homeless at age 50, paraded himself as the unholiest Minimalist, an outrageous dissonant dissident even in the seemingly accepting new music community.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 4, 2021
The next instant he was spluttering and coughing, for the doctor had dexterously placed a pill, composed of the unholiest ingredients of the engineers' stores, in the wide-open cavity.
From The Wireless Officer by Westerman, Percy F. (Percy Francis)
It was distinctly unbecoming in a woman whose sins were so grievous to ripple on so light-heartedly about the unholiest of cities when they sat there as jurors waiting to hear her plea for mercy.
From Otherwise Phyllis by Gibson, Charles Dana
Amfortas, mourning that he, the unholiest of them, should be called, opens a golden shrine and takes out the crystal vessel.
From The Standard Operas (12th edition) Their Plots, Their Music, and Their Composers by Upton, George P. (George Putnam)
As this apartment threatened him with still more rent veils of the unholiest, he took his leave without special ceremony, and went back without the Lector, who had to-day to give a reading.
From Titan: A Romance v. 1 (of 2) by Richter, Jean Paul Friedrich
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
