Dictionary.com
definitions
  • synonyms

grievous

[gree-vuh s]
See more synonyms for grievous on Thesaurus.com
adjective
  1. causing grief or great sorrow: grievous news.
  2. flagrant; outrageous; atrocious: a grievous offense against morality.
  3. full of or expressing grief; sorrowful: a grievous cry.
  4. burdensome or oppressive.
  5. causing great pain or suffering: arrested for causing grievous bodily harm to someone in a bar.
Show More

Origin of grievous

1250–1300; Middle English grevous < Old French grevo(u)s. See grieve, -ous
Related formsgriev·ous·ly, adverbgriev·ous·ness, nounnon·griev·ous, adjectivenon·griev·ous·ly, adverbnon·griev·ous·ness, nouno·ver·griev·ous, adjectiveo·ver·griev·ous·ly, adverbo·ver·griev·ous·ness, noun

Synonyms

See more synonyms for grievous on Thesaurus.com
1. distressing, sad, sorrowful, painful. 2. deplorable, lamentable, calamitous, heinous, flagitious, dreadful, shameful, iniquitous.

Antonyms

1. delightful.
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018

Examples from the Web for grievously

Contemporary Examples

Historical Examples

  • Grievously disordered they appear to be, as Hannah tells me.

    Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9)

    Samuel Richardson

  • But just then my childish pride was grievously piqued by Philip's criticism.

    In the Valley

    Harold Frederic

  • You shall subdue the society which has grievously wronged you, to your own high spirit.

    Little Dorrit

    Charles Dickens

  • "I love Laurent as a brother," said she grievously, when her aunt had ceased speaking.

    Therese Raquin

    Emile Zola

  • What expectations I had formed, and how grievously was I disappointed!

    Phaedo

    Plato

British Dictionary definitions for grievously

grievous

adjective
  1. very severe or painfula grievous injury
  2. very serious; heinousa grievous sin
  3. showing or marked by griefa grievous cry
  4. causing great pain or sufferinga grievous attack
Show More
Derived Formsgrievously, adverbgrievousness, noun
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Word Origin and History for grievously

adv.

mid-14c., from grievous + -ly (2).

Show More

grievous

adj.

c.1300, from Anglo-French grevous (Old French grevos) "heavy, hard, toilsome," from grief (see grief). Legal term grievous bodily harm attested from 1803.

Show More
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper