Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • intransitive verb To be in terror of; fear intensely.
  • intransitive verb To anticipate with alarm, distaste, or reluctance.
  • intransitive verb Archaic To hold in awe or reverence.
  • intransitive verb To be very afraid.
  • noun Profound fear; terror.
  • noun Fearful or anxious anticipation: synonym: fear.
  • noun An instance of fear or fearful anticipation.
  • noun A source of fear, awe, or reverence.
  • noun A dreadlock.
  • noun A person who wears dreadlocks.
  • noun Archaic Awe; reverence.
  • adjective Causing terror or fear.
  • adjective Inspiring awe.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Great fear or apprehension; tremulous anticipation of or repugnance to the happening of something: as, the dread of evil; the dread of suffering; the dread of the divine displeasure.
  • noun Awe; fear united with respect; terror.
  • noun A cause or object of apprehension; the person or the thing dreaded.
  • noun Doubt.
  • To fear in a great degree; be in shrinking apprehension or expectation of: used chiefly with reference to the future: as, to dread death.
  • To cause to fear; alarm; frighten.
  • To venerate; hold in respectful awe.
  • To be in great fear, especially of something which may come to pass.
  • Dreaded; such as to excite great fear or apprehension; terrible; frightful.
  • That is to be dreaded or feared; awful; solemn; venerable: as, dread sovereign; a dread tribunal.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • intransitive verb To be in dread, or great fear.
  • noun Great fear in view of impending evil; fearful apprehension of danger; anticipatory terror.
  • noun Reverential or respectful fear; awe.
  • noun An object of terrified apprehension.
  • noun obsolete A person highly revered.
  • noun obsolete Fury; dreadfulness.
  • noun obsolete Doubt.
  • transitive verb To fear in a great degree; to regard, or look forward to, with terrific apprehension.
  • adjective Exciting great fear or apprehension; causing terror; frightful; dreadful.
  • adjective Inspiring with reverential fear; awful' venerable

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb To fear greatly.
  • verb To anticipate with fear.
  • noun A great fear.
  • noun Somebody or something dreaded.
  • noun A Rastafarian.
  • noun dreadlock
  • adjective Terrible; greatly feared.
  • adjective archaic Awe-inspiring; held in fearful awe.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective causing fear or dread or terror
  • verb be afraid or scared of; be frightened of
  • noun fearful expectation or anticipation

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English dreden, short for adreden, from Old English adrǣdan, from ondrǣdan, to advise against, fear : ond-, and-, against; see un– + rǣdan, to advise; see ar- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Middle English dreden, from Old English drǣdan ("to fear, caution against"), aphetic form of ādrǣdan, ondrǣdan ("to advise or counsel against"); compare with Dutch ontraden ("to advise or counsel against"), from and- ("against") + rǣdan ("to counsel, advise"). Akin to Old High German intrātan ("to fear"). More at read.

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Examples

  • This sucks and really waiting in dread is so crushing to a mother.

    Dark | Her Bad Mother 2007

  • While the seamen, pointing fingers, shrink in dread, and cry, 'Turn back!'

    The Voyage of Magellan 2010

  • Our dread is to guard your poise, and to avoid intruding.

    "HIgh above the mountain, an eagle calling down..." fusijui 2009

  • Your hours will pass in dread and misery, and soon the bolt will fall which must ravish from you your happiness for ever.

    Chapter 3 2010

  • We the millions of uninsured Americans & others who cannot afford health insurance might as well go to some other planet or continue to live in dread of getting ill.

    Closing a health care loophole 2009

  • Your hours will pass in dread and misery, and soon the bolt will fall which must ravish from you your happiness for ever.

    Chapter 20 2010

  • Our own Hemingway wrote so much grandiose nonsense about this so-called sport that the reader feels a certain dread as the climactic spectacle approaches — a dread heightened by the awareness that Montherlant was a matador in his teenage years.

    Monster of Marriage 2010

  • Then the Master, stalking forward where the murderer shrinks in dread,

    The Voyage of Magellan 2010

  • She could be intensely cold-hearted towards enemies, and her children lived in dread of disappointing her.

    Cocotte of the Week: Nancy Astor | Edwardian Promenade 2010

  • But just like the unhappy parents, we watched in dread as the majority of voters, cheered on by the mainstream media, went ahead and married him anyway.

    Matthew Yglesias » Endgame 2010

Comments

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  • dread to advise (put together words) against OR d read

    January 23, 2007