What does "awful" mean?

Awful: Inspiring awe; filling with profound reverence, or with fear and admiration; fitted to inspire reverential fear; profoundly impressive. Heaven's awful Monarch. Milton.

Additional senses

2.Struck or filled with awe; terror-stricken. [Obs.] A weak and awful reverence for antiquity. I. Watts.
3.Worshipful; reverential; law-abiding. [Obs.] Thrust from the company of awful men. Shak.
4.Frightful; exceedingly bad; great; -- applied intensively; as, an awful bonnet; an awful boaster. [Slang]

Sources

Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913 edition (public domain, via GCIDE / Project Gutenberg).
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Published: 2026-07-17T00:00:00-07:00 · Modified: 2026-07-17T00:00:00-07:00