ODIUM: "Intense hatred or dislike; loathing; abhorrence"

By MsW


Dictionary.com/Word of the Day Archive/odium
Word of the Day Archive
Saturday June 4, 2005

odium \OH-dee-uhm\, noun:
1. Intense hatred or dislike; loathing; abhorrence.
2. The state or fact of being intensely hated as the result of some despicable action.
3. Disgrace or discredit attaching to something hated or repugnant.

At the back of the Tyn Church, we were told about the young Jesuit whose harshness earned him the odium of his congregation.
-- Will Cohu, "High spirits and gloomy spectres", Sunday Telegraph, May 16, 1999

The point here is that, for all its efforts at avoiding offence, new Labour has still managed to attract the odium of the paper that regards itself as the voice of Middle England.
-- "Will Mr Brown hang for a sheep or a lamb?", New Statesman, December 2, 2002

But this brought forth nothing but odium on his head, so much so that he had to backtrack soon afterwards.
-- Andrew Stephen, "A nation left unprotected", New Statesman, November 5, 2001

Moralists warn against the spurious sorrow that afflicts the first-person plural of so many collective apologies: We erred, says the penitent, though he clearly intends to shift blame and odium to his fellows.
-- "The Week", National Review, April 19, 2004

Odium comes from the Latin odium, "hatred," from odisse, "to hate."

Dictionary.com Entry and Pronunciation for odium

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