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”)

The fluctuation between pronunciations with /eɪ/ and /iː/ is old; the former reflects adoption of an unmonophthongised pronunciation of Old French -ai-, while the latter reflects a monophthongised form.

Pronunciation

• (UK, US) IPA^(key): /ˈheɪnəs/
• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈhiːnəs/

• Audio (UK):

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• Audio (US):

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• Audio (General Australian):

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• Rhymes: -eɪnəs

Adjective

heinous (comparative more heinous, superlative most heinous)

1. Totally reprehensible.

   I hope they catch the person responsible for that heinous crime.

   The perpetrators of this heinous act must be brought to justice.

   • 2021 October 12, Jamie Lyall, “Faroe Islands 0-1 Scotland”, in BBC Sport‎^[4]:

     Perhaps burdened by the weight of history, talk of the heinous 2-2 draw in 2002, or the magnitude of the fixture, Scotland seemed spooked in the early throes.

2. Bad, evil or villainous.

Synonyms

• (totally reprehensible): abominable, horrible, odious

Antonyms

• unheinous (rare)

Derived terms

• heinously
• heinousness
• unheinous

Related terms

• hate

Collocations

with nouns

• heinous crime
• heinous act
• heinous sin
• heinous murder
• heinous offence

Translations

totally reprehensible

• Armenian: զզվելի (hy) (zzveli), նողկալի (hy) (noġkali), գարշելի (hy) (garšeli), անպետք (hy) (anpetkʻ), սարսափելի (hy) (sarsapʻeli), զարհուրելի (hy) (zarhureli)
• Bulgarian: отвратителен (bg) (otvratitelen), гнусен (bg) (gnusen)
• Czech: ohavný, odporný (cs)
• Danish: afskyelig (da), frygtelig, grufuld, motbydelig
• Dutch: afschuwelijk (nl), afgrijselijk (nl), afschrikwekkend (nl), verschrikkelijk (nl), verwerpelijk (nl)
• Faroese: andstyggiligur
• Finnish: katala (fi), kauhea (fi), hirvittävä (fi)
• French: atroce (fr)
• Galician: atroz (gl)
• German: abscheulich (de), verabscheuungswürdig (de)
• Greek: στυγερός (el) m (stygerós), αποτρόπαιος (el) m (apotrópaios), απεχθής (el) m (apechthís), μισητός (el) m (misitós)
• Hungarian: förtelmes (hu), szörnyű (hu)
• Icelandic: viðbjóðslegur (is)
• Italian: efferato (it), abominevole (it), odioso (it)
• Maori: whakarihariha, mōrihariha
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: avskyelig, motbydelig (no)

  Nynorsk: avskyeleg

• Portuguese: hediondo (pt)
• Russian: гну́сный (ru) (gnúsnyj), ме́рзкий (ru) (mérzkij), отврати́тельный (ru) (otvratítelʹnyj)
• Spanish: atroz (es)
• Swedish: avskyvärd (sv), vedervärdig (sv), förfärlig (sv), ohygglig (sv), skändlig (sv)
• Ukrainian: жахли́вий m (žaxlývyj), оги́дний (uk) m (ohýdnyj), мерзе́нний m (merzénnyj)

Anagrams

• in house, in-house, inhouse