dread
Noun pluraldreads (some meanings)
Formsdreads, dreading, dreaded
Pluraldreads (some meanings)
- 1To be very afraid of something, or to look ahead to something that is coming with great fear or unwillingness.
Most employees dread the annual performance review.
He has been dreading telling his parents that he lost his job.
UsageUsually followed by a noun or an -ing form, often in the progressive: I'm dreading the results, dreading telling them.
Similarfear
Note
In Anna Sewell's Black Beauty (1877), a horse who once looked forward to his harness begins to dread it as the bearing reins are shortened.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- Anna Sewell wrote Black Beauty. en.wikisource.org
- Black Beauty was first published in 1877. gutenberg.org
- The horse narrator begins to dread being harnessed as the bearing reins are shortened. en.wiktionary.org
- 2Great fear of some danger or evil that is expected to come.
A sense of dread settled over the town as the floodwaters kept rising.
For months the workers lived in constant dread of another round of layoffs.
UsageUsually dread of something or a that-clause; a thought can fill someone with dread.
Similarfear, apprehension, foreboding, trepidation, terror
Note
It takes of, as in Hamlet's line about the dread of something after death, or a that-clause, as when Joseph Heller writes in Catch-22 of a common dread that he would begin moaning.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- Hamlet speaks the line containing 'the dread of something after death'. en.wikisource.org
- Joseph Heller's Catch-22 contains the sentence 'They shared a common dread that he would begin moaning.' en.wiktionary.org
- 3Terrible and greatly feared.
Tuberculosis was a dread disease in the crowded cities of the past.
The old sailors lowered their voices whenever they spoke of the dread reef at the harbor mouth.
UsageUsually goes before its noun: a dread disease, the dread reef.
Similarfearsome, terrible, feared
Note
The adjective began as an old past participle of the verb, meaning "feared", which is why a dread disease is one people fear, not one that is afraid. It usually stands before its noun, as in that dread path in Rider Haggard's She or the dread moray eel, though verse can put it after: Gilbert and Sullivan's pirates steal along "in silence dread".
Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 4 facts
- The adjective derives from an old past participle meaning 'feared'. en.wiktionary.org
- The phrase 'that dread path' occurs in Rider Haggard's She. gutenberg.org
- The Pirates of Penzance is by Gilbert and Sullivan. en.wikisource.org
- The pirates sing 'In silence dread', placing the adjective after its noun. en.wikisource.org
- 4Short for dreadlock: a thick, rope-like strand of hair made by tangling or twisting it together.
She tied her dreads back before she went on stage.
He tucked a loose dread behind his ear and kept talking.
UsageUse grow dreads or tie your dreads back. One dread is a single lock.
Less common meanings
- 5
- 6To style someone's hair into dreadlocks.
Stylists who dread hair often charge by the hour.
Using a crochet hook and a tin of beeswax, she dreaded her son's hair into neat, even locks.
- 7A member of the Rastafari movement; a Rastafarian.
Several dreads from the local Rastafari community spoke at the meeting.
The elder was a dread who had kept the faith for fifty years.
SimilarRasta, Rastafarian
- 8Fear mixed with reverence or deep respect; a feeling of awe.
The pilgrims entered the cathedral in a kind of holy dread.
Even the generals spoke of the emperor with a dread that was half devotion.
Note
Fear and reverence are one feeling here, the response owed to a god or a king. The noun often pairs with fear: "the fear of you and the dread of you" in the King James Bible of 1611, "the dread and fear of kings" in Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice. Where the anxious noun looks ahead to harm, this dread looks up.
Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 3 facts
- The King James Bible was first published in 1611. exhibits.lib.byu.edu
- The King James Bible contains the quoted pairing, in Genesis 9:2. en.wikisource.org
- The quotation occurs in Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice, spoken by Portia as Balthazar in Act 4, scene 1. folger.edu
- 9To be filled with great fear.
Dread not, neither be afraid of them.
1611, The Holy Bible, King James VersionNote
Without an object, the verb describes a state of mind rather than fear of something in particular: someone lies awake and dreads. The King James Bible of 1611 uses it in a command, "Dread not, neither be afraid of them", pairing it with its plainer twin, be afraid.
Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 2 facts
- The King James Bible was first published in 1611. exhibits.lib.byu.edu
- Deuteronomy 1:29 contains the quoted command, pairing 'Dread not' with 'neither be afraid of them'. en.wikisource.org
- 10Inspiring awe, and held in fearful reverence.
Petitioners knelt in silence before the dread throne.
The old hymn calls on the dread majesty of heaven.
UsageIn hymns and solemn phrases, it goes before its noun: dread sovereign, dread majesty.
Note
The adjective grew from a past participle meaning "feared, honored", which is why it carries reverence along with the fear. Royal titles used it, as when a collection of statutes from Charles I's reign calls him "most high and dread soveraigne" in its title.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 1 fact
- The adjective derives from a past participle meaning feared or honoured. en.wiktionary.org
- 11Fury, or the terrible quality that makes something feared.
The mightie ones, affrayd of every chaunges dread
1596, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie QueeneNote
The word is turned around: dread is the terror a thing gives off, not the fear someone feels. When Spenser, in Book VI of The Faerie Queene (1596), writes of the mighty ones "affrayd of every chaunges dread", he means the menace that change carries. The use is long obsolete; modern English keeps the felt fear of the everyday noun.
Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 6 facts
- Dread has an obsolete sense meaning dreadfulness, the quality that inspires fear. en.wiktionary.org
- Book VI of Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene was first published in 1596. en.wikisource.org
- Spenser writes the quoted words about the mighty ones in Book VI, Canto IX. en.wikisource.org
- Dread in this quotation means the menace or dreadfulness of change. en.wiktionary.org
- The dreadfulness sense is obsolete. en.wiktionary.org
- Modern English also retains the noun sense meaning somebody or something dreaded. en.wiktionary.org
- 12A person held in the highest reverence.
Note
In this long-obsolete use, the feeling turns into the person it is felt for. Spenser's The Faerie Queene (1590) calls Una "his dear dread", a phrase that folds tenderness and reverence together. A modern writer would say his revered lady, or simply his beloved.
Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 4 facts
- Dread has an obsolete sense denoting a highly revered person. en.wiktionary.org
- The relevant part of Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene was first published in 1590. en.wikisource.org
- The poem calls Una his dear dread; the quotation uses modernized spelling. gutenberg.org
- The phrase conveys affection and reverence. gutenberg.org
- 13Short for dreadnought: a big battleship of the early 1900s whose main guns were all large and the same size.
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origins
Proto-West Germanic *andarādan, which matches Old English and- plus rǣdan (the source of read), gave Old English ondrǣdan ("to fear, dread"). Its shortened form drǣdan ("to fear, dread") became Middle English dreden. Related words include Old Saxon antdrādan and Old High German intrātan ("to fear").
This noun was formed from the verb and appeared in Middle English as drede or dred. It has a cognate in Old Frisian drēd or drēde ("fear, dread").
Middle English dreden ("to fear, dread") had the past participle drede or dredde ("feared, dreaded, honored"), which is the source of this word.