accursed
English
WOTD – 31 August 2008
Alternative forms
- (obsolete) accurst [13th C.]
Etymology
- First attested in the early 13th century.
- From Middle English acursed, from acursen (“to curse”), from Old English ācursian, from ā + cursen, from curs (“curse”).
Pronunciation
Adjective
accursed (comparative more accursed, superlative most accursed)
- (prenominal) Hateful; detestable, loathsome.
- c. 1789, William Blake, Tiriel:
- Accursed race of Tiriel. behold your father // Come forth & look on her that bore you. come you accursed sons.
- 1819, Ivanhoe, Walter Scott, Chapter 35:
- Lo! they are charged with studying the accursed cabalistical secrets of the Jews, and the magic of the Paynim Saracens.
- 1885, Richard F. Burton, The Supplemental Nights to the Thousand Nights and a Night, Night 532:
- […] Alaeddin ate and drank and was cheered and after he had rested and had recovered spirits he cried, "Ah, O my mother, I have a sore grievance against thee for leaving me to that accursed wight who strave to compass my destruction and designed to take my life. Know that I beheld Death with mine own eyes at the hand of this damned wretch, whom thou didst certify to be my uncle; […]
- (theology) Doomed to destruction or misery; cursed; anathematized.
- c. 1587–1588, [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire, London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act II, scene iv:
- Accurſt be he that firſt inuented war
- 1885, Charles Abel Heurtley, transl., The Commonitory of Vincent of Lérins, Chapter 8:
- […] —if any one, be he who he may, attempt to alter the faith once for all delivered, let him be accursed.
- 1912, Fyodor Dostoevsky, translated by Constance Garnett, The Brothers Karamazov, Book III, Chapter 7,
- For at the very moment I become accursed, at that same highest moment, I become exactly like a heathen […]
- 1955, J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King, The Return of the King/Book V, Chapter 10
- We did not come here to waste words in treating with Sauron, faithless and accursed; still less with one of his slaves. Begone!
Derived terms
Translations
hateful
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theology: cursed
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