Adjective
dreadful
Usage- Obsolete
- Examples
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More examples (2)
1652, Anonymous, "Christs Kingdome" in Eliza's Babes, Or, The Virgin's Offering, critical edition by L. E. Semler, Associated University Press, 2001, p. 73, lines 16-20, At thy approach, black shades did vanish, / And from my heart thou feare didst banish, / And in their room did light appear, / And joy instead of dreadly feare.
1770, Oliver Goldsmith, The Deserted Village, in The Poetical Works of Dr. Goldsmith, London: J. Osborne & T. Griffin, 1785, p. 44, […] To distant climes, a dreadly scene, / Where half the convex world intrudes between, / To torrid tracts with fainting steps they go, / Where wild Altama murmurs to their woe.
Lo! 'mid the dreadly solitude a pilgrim form I see / Swift gliding towards me—
'The teeth of the dreadly viper is still sticking into me!' he yelled.
More examples (3)
Some practices are considered as essential for the attainment of an enlightened life but are looked upon as dreadly or extremely secret.
The Normans made another dreadly appearance in 869, and as they were pagans they had no compunction about attacking, plundering and setting fire to the abbey of Saint-Germain-de-Prés.
dreadly spectacle
Adverb
With dread.
Usage- Obsolete
- Examples
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More examples (2)
1641, Du Bartas His Diuine Weekes And Workes, translated by Josuah Sylvester, London: Robert Young, "The Captains. The Fourth Part of the Third Day of the II. Week," p. 181 So shall you see a Cloud-crown'd Hill somtime, / Torn from a greater by the waste of Time; / Dreadly to shake, and boundling down to hop, / And roaring, here it roules tall Cedars up;
[…] when high in Air / The chos'n Archangel rides, whose right hand weilds / Th'imperial standard of heav'n's providence, / Which dreadly sweeping thro' the vaulted sky / O'ershadows all creation.
His vast countenance was unutterably and dreadly calm;
Dreadly, in sooth, dreadly doth the wise augur move me, who approve not, nor am able to deny.
More examples (2)
The lonely sunsets flare forlorn / Down valleys dreadly desolate;
He had turned dreadly pale.