Etymology Explorer › English

Where does “terrify” come from?

Terrify comes from Middle French terrifier, meaning to frighten or cause terror.

terrify (English): To frighten greatly; to fill with terror; To...

Definitions

  1. To frighten greatly; to fill with terror; To...

Ancestry of “terrify”, step by step

StepLanguageWordMeaning
1Middle Frenchterrifier—
2Latinterrificare—
3Latinterrora dread, terror, great fear, alarm, panic; an...
4Latinfaciō—
5Latin-toriumnominative neuter singular of -tōrius; accusative...
6Latin-tōrius—
7Latin-tor-er
8Proto-Italic-tōr—
9Proto-Indo-European-tōrDerives agent nouns from verbs, denoting someone...
10Proto-Indo-European-tor-s—

Words derived from “terrify”

  • terrifying
  • terrifyingly
  • terrifier
  • unterrifying
  • terrifyingness
  • unterrifiable
Every word from Proto-Indo-European -tor-s →