heinous
English
WOTD – 16 January 2010
Alternative forms
- hainous (obsolete)
Etymology
From Middle English hainous, from Old French haïneus (compare French haineux) from haïr (“to hate”), hadir (“to hate”) (compare Old French enhadir (“to become filled with hate”)), from Frankish *hattjan (“to hate”)
Pronunciation
Adjective
heinous (comparative more heinous, superlative most heinous)
- Totally reprehensible.
- I hope they catch the person responsible for that heinous crime.
- The perpetrators of this heinous act must be brought to justice.
Synonyms
- (totally reprehensible): abominable, horrible, odious
Antonyms
- unheinous (rare)
Derived terms
Related terms
Collocations
with nouns
- heinous crime
- heinous act
- heinous sin
- heinous murder
- heinous offence
Translations
totally reprehensible
This article is issued from Wiktionary. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.