Definition of abhor
- abhorred violence
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abhors the way people leave their trash at the picnic sites in the park
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Abhor means “to loathe” or “to hate,” and while loathe and hate have roots in Old English, abhor derives from Latin. The roots of abhor can give us a deeper understanding of both the strength of the dislike expressed by the word and its relationship to other words in English. It came from the Latin word abhorrēre, which meant “to recoil from” or “to be repugnant to,” and was formed by combining ab-, meaning “from” and horrēre, meaning “to bristle,” “to tremble,” or “to shudder.” This word for trembling or shuddering in reaction to something scary or awful is related to the word that names of the cause of those reactions—the Latin word horror, which was later borrowed into English. The -hor of abhor is also the hor- of horror.
See words that rhyme with abhor Thesaurus: All synonyms and antonyms for abhor Spanish Central: Translation of abhor Nglish: Translation of abhor for Spanish speakers Britannica English: Translation of abhor for Arabic speakers
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