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Those who shudder to think about having to clean dirty carpets might fairly be said to abhor a vacuum. Nature is often said to abhor a vacuum as well, albeit a different one—according to plenists, there is always some matter or material floating around ready to fill a void. Interior designers afflicted with horror vacui abhor vacuums as well, being unable to tolerate empty spaces in artistic designs. In each of these cases, abhor implies strong feelings of disgust and aversion, a degree of distaste embedded in the word's history: the word's Latin source, the verb abhorrēre, comes from the prefix ab- ("from, away") and the verb horrēre ("to bristle, shiver, or shudder"). Horrēre is also the source of the English words horror, horrify, and horrible.
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The Horror in Abhor
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.
Examples of abhor in a Sentence
David Frum, Atlantic, March 1995
I abhor latter-day, modishly camp take-offs of my cherished boyhood heroes and heroines (Little Orphan Annie, Wonder Woman, Invisible Scarlet O'Neil).
—Mordecai Richler, New York Times Book Review, 3 May 1987
He abhorred grandiosity. When he came to New York to revise his manuscripts and galley proofs, he would hole up in a little cubicle on the attic floor of the old 52nd Street mansion that went by the name of Random House.
—Norman Cousins, Saturday Review, April 1981
abhors the way people leave their trash at the picnic sites in the park
Charles Selle, Chicago Tribune, 14 July 2025
Musk himself seems to abhor guardrails generally—except in cases where guardrails help him personally—preferring to hurriedly ship products, rapid unscheduled disassemblies be damned.
—Matteo Wong, The Atlantic, 8 July 2025
Gore gave it a listen, but was quickly abhorred by the salacious content.
—Colson Thayer, People.com, 28 Apr. 2025
For all of the Closet’s viral success, Criterion’s executives seem to abhor talking about it as a marketing tool.
—Tim Grierson, Los Angeles Times, 28 Apr. 2025
See All Example Sentences for abhor
Cite this Entry
“Abhor.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/abhor. Accessed 24 Jul. 2025.
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abhor
verb
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