Ominous

English

Adjective

Ominous (comparative more Ominous, superlative most Ominous)

1. Of or pertaining to an omen or to omens; being or exhibiting an omen; significant.
2. Specifically, giving indication of a coming ill; being an evil omen; threatening; portentous; inauspicious.
   • California poll support for Jerry Brown's tax increases has ominous implications for U.S. taxpayers too Los Angeles Times Headline April 25, 2011

Notes

• Formerly used both in a favorable and unfavorable sense; now chiefly in the latter; foreboding or foreshadowing evil; inauspicious; as, an ominous dread.
• Nouns to which "ominous" is often applied: sign, silence, warning, cloud, note, sound, shadow, threat, music, tone, implication, message, presence, development, voice, portent, turn, sky, figure, dream, event, trend, change, day, beginning, growl, cry, signal, pattern.

Synonyms

• portentous
• threatening

Derived terms

• ominously
• ominousness

Related terms

• omen

Adverbs for Ominous

unmistakably; significantly; disturbingly; distressingly; sadly; prophetically; alarmingly; unpleasantly; dismally; markedly; noticeably; drearily; fearfully; terribly; heartbreakingly.

Thesaurus

abusive, admonitory, apocalyptic, augural, bad, badly off, baleful, baneful, black, bludgeoning, blustering, bodeful, boding, browbeating, bulldozing, bullying, cautionary, comminatory, corroding, corrosive, corrupting, corruptive, counterproductive, damaging, dark, deadly, deleterious, denunciatory, depressed, detrimental, dire, direful, disadvantageous, disserviceable, distressing, donsie, doomful, dreary, evil, evil-starred, fatal, fateful, fear-inspiring, forbidding, foreboding, foreshadowing, foretelling, foretokening, fortuneless, funest, gloomy, grim, hapless, harmful, hectoring, hostile, hurtful, ill, ill off, ill-boding, ill-fated, ill-omened, ill-starred, imminent, in adverse circumstances, inauspicious, indicative, inhospitable, injurious, intimidating, lethal, lowering, luckless, malefic, maleficent, malevolent, malign, malignant, mantic, meaningful, menacing, minacious, minatory, mischievous, noisome, noxious, of evil portent, oracular, out of luck, pernicious, planet-struck, poisonous, portending, portentous, predictive, prejudicial, premonitory, prognostic, prophetic, sad, scatheful, short of luck, sibyllic, sinister, somber, star-crossed, terroristic, terrorizing, threatening, threatful, toxic, unblessed, underprivileged, unfavorable, unfortunate, unfriendly, unhappy, unlucky, unpromising, unpropitious, unprosperous, unprovidential, untoward, vaticinal, venenate, veneniferous, venenous, venomous, vicious, virulent, warning

Etymology

From Latin ominosus (“full of foreboding”) < omen (“forebiden fruit, omen”) < os (“the mouth”) + -men

Translations

of or pertaining to an omen or to omens; being or exhibiting an omen

Arabic: please add this translation if you can Bulgarian: please add this translation if you can Catalan: ominós (ca) Danish: varslende (da) Dutch: please add this translation if you can Finnish: enteellinen (fi) French: please add this translation if you can Georgian: ავბედი (ka) (avbedi) German: please add this translation if you can Hungarian: ominózus (hu) Italian: please add this translation if you can Japanese: please add this translation if you can

Kannada: please add this translation if you can Korean: please add this translation if you can Mandarin: please add this translation if you can Portuguese: ominoso (pt) Russian: предвещающий (ru) (pr'edv'eš'ájuš'ij) Spanish: please add this translation if you can Tamil: please add this translation if you can Telugu: please add this translation if you can Turkish: please add this translation if you can Ukrainian: please add this translation if you can Vietnamese: please add this translation if you can Persian: please add this translation if you can

giving indication of a coming ill

Catalan: ominós (ca) Czech: zlověstný (cs) Danish: ildevarslende (da), uheldsvanger (da) Dutch: please add this translation if you can Estonian: please add this translation if you can Finnish: pahaenteinen (fi), uhkaava (fi) Georgian: ავბედი (ka) (avbedi) German: please add this translation if you can Hungarian: baljós (hu), baljóslatú (hu) Italian: please add this translation if you can Japanese: please add this translation if you can Kannada: please add this translation if you can

Korean: please add this translation if you can Mandarin: please add this translation if you can Polish: złowróżbny m., złowieszczy m. Portuguese: please add this translation if you can Romanian: fatidic (ro) Russian: зловещий (ru) (zlov'éš'ij) Spanish: ominoso (es) m., ominosa (es) f. Tamil: please add this translation if you can Telugu: please add this translation if you can Turkish: please add this translation if you can Ukrainian: please add this translation if you can Vietnamese: please add this translation if you can

The translations below need to be checked.

Translations to be checked

French: de mauvais augure(2) Indonesian: mencekam, gelagat buruk Kurdish: ziyandar (1); bêyom (2), bêxêr (2), bêoxir (2) Latin: ominosus

External links

• Ominous in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913
• Ominous in The Century Dictionary, The Century Co., New York, 1911