horror

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   An intense distressing emotion of fear or repugnance.

   Their swarthy Hosts wou'd darken all our Plains, / Doubling the native Horror of the War, / And making Death more grim.

2. 2
   noun

   Something horrible; that which excites horror.

   I saw many horrors during the war.

3. 3
   noun

   Intense dislike or aversion; an abhorrence.

   “Mrs. Yule's chagrin and horror at what she called her son's base ingratitude knew no bounds ; at first it was even thought that she would never get over it. […] ”

4. 4
   noun

   A genre of fiction designed to evoke a feeling of fear and suspense.

   Those who enjoy horror, stories overflowing with blood and black mystery, will be grateful to Richard Marsh for writing ‘The Beetle.’

5. 5
   noun

   A nasty or ill-behaved person; a rascal or terror.

   The neighbour's kids are a pack of little horrors!

6. 6
   noun

   Delirium tremens.

   `My belief is that he had the horrors without knowin' it.'

7. 7
   noun

   something that inspires dislike

8. 8
   noun

   intense aversion

Etymology

From Middle English horer, horrour, from Old French horror, from Latin horror (“a bristling, a shaking, trembling as with cold or fear, terror”), from horrere (“to bristle, shake, be terrified”). Displaced native Old English ōga.