Worst \Worst\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Worsted; p. pr. & vb. n.
Worsting.] [See
Worse, v. t. & a.] To
gain advantage over, in contest or competition; to get the better
of; to defeat; to overthrow; to discomfit. [1913 Webster] The . . .
Philistines were worsted by the captivated ark. --South. [1913
Webster]
Worst \Worst\, v. i. To grow worse; to
deteriorate. [R.] "Every face . . . worsting." --Jane Austen. [1913
Webster]
Worst \Worst\, a., superl. of Bad. [OE. werst, worste, wurste, AS.
wyrst, wierst, wierrest. See Worse, a.] Bad, evil, or
pernicious, in the highest degree, whether in a physical or moral
sense. See Worse. "Heard
so oft in worst extremes." --Milton. [1913 Webster] I have a wife,
the worst that may be. --Chaucer. [1913 Webster] If thou hadst not
been born the worst of men, Thou hadst been a knave and flatterer.
--Shak. [1913 Webster]
Bad \Bad\ (b[a^]d), a. [Compar. Worse (w[^u]s); superl. Worst (w[^u]st).] [Probably fr.
AS. b[ae]ddel hermaphrodite; cf. b[ae]dling effeminate fellow.]
Wanting good qualities, whether physical or moral; injurious,
hurtful, inconvenient, offensive, painful, unfavorable, or
defective, either physically or morally; evil; vicious; wicked; --
the opposite of good; as, a
bad man; bad conduct; bad habits; bad soil; bad air; bad health; a
bad crop; bad news. Note: Sometimes used substantively. [1913
Webster] The strong antipathy of good to bad. --Pope. [1913
Webster] Syn: Pernicious; deleterious; noxious; baneful; injurious;
hurtful; evil; vile; wretched; corrupt; wicked; vicious; imperfect.
[1913 Webster]
Word Net
worst adj : (superlative of `bad') most wanting in quality or value or condition; "the worst player on the team"; "the worst weather of the year" [ant: best]Noun
1 the least favorable outcome; "the worst that
could happen"
2 the greatest damage or wickedness of which one
is capable; "the invaders did their worst"; "so pure of heart that
his worst is another man's best"
3 the weakest effort or poorest achievement one
is capable of; "it was the worst he had ever done on a test" [ant:
best] adv : to the highest
degree of inferiority or badness; "She suffered worst of all";
"schools were the worst hit by government spending cuts"; "the
worst dressed person present" v : defeat thoroughly; "He mopped up
the floor with his opponents" [syn: pip, mop up, whip, rack up]
worst See bad
bad adj
1 having undesirable or negative qualities; "a
bad report card"; "his sloppy appearance made a bad impression"; "a
bad little boy"; "clothes in bad shape"; "a bad cut"; "bad luck";
"the news was very bad"; "the reviews were bad"; "the pay is bad";
"it was a bad light for reading"; "the movie was a bad choice"
[ant: good]
2 very intense; "a bad headache"; "in a big
rage"; "had a big (or bad) shock"; "a bad earthquake"; "a bad
storm" [syn: big]
3 feeling physical discomfort or pain (`tough' is
occasionally used colloquially for `bad'); "my throat feels bad";
"she felt bad all over"; "he was feeling tough after a restless
night" [syn: tough]
4 (of foodstuffs) not in an edible or usable
condition; "bad meat"; "a refrigerator full of spoilt food" [syn:
spoiled, spoilt]
5 not capable of being collected; "a bad (or
uncollectible) debt" [syn: uncollectible]
6 below average in quality or performance; "a bad
chess player"; "a bad recital"
7 nonstandard; "so-called bad grammar"
8 not financially safe or secure; "a bad
investment"; "high risk investments"; "anything that promises to
pay too much can't help being risky"; "speculative business
enterprises" [syn: insecure, risky, high-risk,
speculative]
9 physically unsound or diseased; "has a bad
back"; "a bad heart"; "bad teeth"; "an unsound limb"; "unsound
teeth" [syn: unfit,
unsound]
10 capable of harming; "bad habits"; "bad air";
"smoking is bad for you"
11 keenly sorry or regretful; "felt bad about
letting the team down"; "was sorry that she had treated him so
badly"; "felt bad about breaking the vase" [syn: sorry]
12 characterized by wickedness or immorality;
"led a very bad life" [syn: immoral]
13 reproduced fraudulently; "like a bad
penny..."; "a forged twenty dollar bill" [syn: forged]
14 not working properly; "a bad telephone
connection"; "a defective appliance" [syn: defective] n : that which is
below standard or expectations as of ethics or decency; "take the
bad with the good" [syn: badness] [ant: good, good] adv
1 with great intensity (`bad' is a nonstandard
variant for `badly'); "the injury hurt badly"; "the buildings were
badly shaken"; "it hurts bad"; "we need water bad" [syn: badly]
2 very much; strongly; "I wanted it badly enough
to work hard for it"; "the cables had sagged badly"; "they were
badly in need of help"; "he wants a bicycle so bad he can taste it"
[syn: badly] [also:
worst, worse]
Moby Thesaurus
abominable, arrant, atrocious, awful, base, bear the palm, beastly, beat, beat all hollow, beat hollow, beneath contempt, best, blameworthy, brutal, clobber, contemptible, defeat, deplorable, despicable, destroy, detestable, dire, disgusting, do in, down, dreadful, drub, egregious, enormous, fetid, filthy, fix, flagrant, foul, fulsome, grievous, gross, hateful, heinous, hide, horrible, horrid, hors de combat, infamous, lambaste, lamentable, lather, lick, loathsome, lousy, monstrous, nasty, nefarious, noisome, notorious, obnoxious, odious, offensive, outclass, outdo, outfight, outgeneral, outmaneuver, outpoint, outrageous, outrun, outsail, outshine, pip, pitiable, pitiful, put, rank, regrettable, reprehensible, repulsive, rotten, ruin, sad, scandalous, schlock, scurvy, settle, shabby, shameful, shocking, shoddy, skin, skin alive, sordid, squalid, take the cake, terrible, thrash, too bad, trim, triumph, triumph over, trounce, unclean, undo, vile, villainous, whip, win, woeful, worthless, wretchedEnglish
Adjective
worst- Most inferior; doing the least good.
- Most unfavorable.
- That's the worst news I've had all day.
- Most harmful or severe.
- Most ill.
- I'm feeling really ill - the worst I've felt all week.
Synonyms
- (most ill): illest (nonstandard)
Related terms
Translations
- Arabic: (al-’áswa’)
- Chinese: 最坏 (zuìhuaì)
- Danish: værst
- Dutch: slechtst, ergst
- Esperanto: la pli malbona
- Finnish: pahin
- French: le pire , la pire
- German: schlechtest
- Interlingua: pejor
- Italian: il peggiore
- Japanese: 最悪な (さいあくな, saiaku na)
- Korean: 가장 나쁜 (gajang nappeun)
- Portuguese: pior
- Russian: наихудший (naikhúdšij)
- Spanish: lo peor , la peor
- Swedish: värst
- Turkish: en kötü
Noun
- (with the) Something that is worst.
- None of these photographs of me is good, but this one is definitely the worst.
Derived terms
- In the worst way; most badly.
- My sore leg hurts worst when it's cold and rainy.
- This is the worst-written essay I've ever seen.
- She's the worst-informed of the lot.
- This is the worst-written essay I've ever seen.
- My sore leg hurts worst when it's cold and rainy.
- Most ill.
Verb
Dutch
Noun
worstIn grammar the superlative of an
adjective or adverb is the greatest form of
adjective or adverb which indicates that something has some feature
to a greater degree than anything it is being compared to in a
given context. For example, if Adam is 45, Bess is 35, and Chris is
25, Adam is the oldest of the three, because his age transcends
those of Bess and Chris in one direction, while Chris is the
youngest, because his age transcends those of Adam and Bess in the
other direction. If Dan, who is 50, and Edna, who is 20, join the
group, Dan now becomes the oldest and Edna the youngest.
Some
prescriptive grammars hold that, when comparing only two
entities, use of the superlative is ungrammatical: if the group
were to contain only Adam and Bess, Adam would be older, while Bess
would be younger and it would be ungrammatical to say that Adam was
the oldest. The superlative degree used in reference to sets of two
or fewer are found, however, in writing and speech. In an offer for
auction to the "highest bidder" in which only one bid were
received, for example, no rule of English grammar would negate the
sale.
Many ancient grammarians object to the use of the
superlative or comparative with words such as "full," "complete,"
"unique" or "empty," which by definition already denote either a
totality, an absence, or an absolute. However, such words are
routinely and frequently qualified in contemporary speech and
writing. This type of usage conveys more of a figurative than a literal meaning. For example, in
the phrase "most complete selection of wines in the Midwest," "most
complete" doesn't mean "closest to having all elements
represented," it merely connotes a well-rounded, relatively
extensive selection. Browsing in some of the better-known
search-engines for "more complete" or "most complete" would
establish the frequency of this usage by many millions of
examples.
In English
In English,
the superlative and the comparative are created by
inflecting adjectives or adverbs. The structure of a
superlative consists normally of the positive
stem of the adjective or adverb, plus the suffix -est, or (especially in
words of a Latin or Romance origin) the modifier "most" or "least"
before the adjective or adverb. It always has the definite article
and is completed by "of" or other preposition plus one or more
nouns of entities that it
surpasses to the highest or greatest degree, such as in "he is the
tallest of/in the class," or "the town is the most beautiful in the
country."
Mention should be made also of the elative,
which is not an actual separate inflection but the intensified
degree of adverbs and adjectives. Adjectives at the elative do not
refer to other objects, like a superlative does; e.g., "she is very
beautiful"; "she is most beautiful" (intensification in this case
means "very beautiful indeed"). Simply put; the word 'superlative'
is defined as:
- (as a noun) an exaggerated mode of expression (usually of praise); "the critics lavished superlatives on it"
- (as a noun) the greatest: the highest in quality
- the superlative form of an adjective; `best' is the superlative form of `good', 'most' when used together with an adjective or adverb
In other languages
Romance languages
In contrast to English, in the grammars of most
romance languages the elative and the superlative are joined into
the same degree (superlative), which can be of two kinds:
comparative (e.g. "the most beautiful") and absolute (e.g. "very
beautiful").
French:
The superlative is created from the comparative by inserting the
definitive article (la, le, or les) before "plus" or "moins" and
the adjective determining the noun. For instance: Elle est la plus
belle femme → (she is the most beautiful woman); Cette ville est la
moins chère de France → (this town is the least expensive in
France).
Spanish:
The comparative superlative, like in French, has the definite
article (such as "las", "el"), or the possessive article (such as
"tus", "nuestra", "su"), followed by the comparative ("más" or
"menos"), so that "el meñique es el dedo más pequeño" is "the pinky
is the smallest finger." Irregular comparatives are "mejor" for
"bueno" and "peor" for malo" which can be used as comparative
superlatives also by adding the definite article or possessive
article, so that, "nuestro peor error fue casarnos" is "our worst
mistake was to get married."
The absolute superlative is normally formed by
modifying the adjective by adding -ísimo, -ísima, -ísimos or
-ísimas, depending on the gender or number. So that "¡Los
chihuahuas son perros pequeñísimos!" is "Chihuahuas are such tiny
dogs!" Some irregular superlatives are "máximo" for "grande",
"pésimo" for "malo", "ínfimo" for "bajo", "óptimo" for "bueno",
"acérrimo" for "acre", "paupérrimo" for "pobre", "celebérrimo" for
"célebre".
Note the difference between comparative
superlative and absolute superlative: Ella es la más bella → (she
is the most beautiful); Ella es bellísima → (she is extremely
beautiful).
Portuguese
and Italian
distinguish comparative superlative (superlativo relativo), and
absolute superlative ''(superlativo absoluto/assoluto).
For the comparative superlative they use the
words "mais" and "più" between the article and the adjective, like
"most" in English.
For the absolute superlative they either use
"muito"/"molto" and the adjective or modify the adjective by taking
away the final vowel and adding issimo (singular masculine), issima
(singular feminine), íssimos/issimi (plural masculine), or
íssimas/issime (plural feminine). For example:
- Aquele avião é velocíssimo/Quell'aereoplano è velocissimo → That airplane is very fast
- "Acre" (acer in Latin) which means acrid, becomes "acérrimo"/"acerrimo" ("acerrimus" in Latin).
- Italian "simile" (similis in Latin) which means "similar", becomes "simillimo" ("simillimus" in Latin).
- Portuguese "difícil" ("hard/difficult") and "fácil" ("easy") always become "dificílimo" and "facílimo".
Celtic languages
Scottish
Gaelic: When comparing one entity to another in present or
future tense, the adjective is changed by adding an e to the end
and i before the final consonant(s) if the final vowel is broad.
Then, the adjective is preceded by nas to say "more," and as to say
"most." (The word na is used to mean than.) Adjectives that begin
with f are lenited. Nas and as use different syntax constructions.
For example:
- Tha mi nas àirde na mo pheathraichean. → I am taller than my sisters.
- Is mi as àirde. → I am the tallest.
As in English, some forms are irregular, i.e. nas
fheàrr (better), nas miosa (worse), etc.
In other tenses, nas is replaced by na bu and as
by a bu, both of which lenite the
adjective if possible. If the adjective begins with a vowel or an f
followed by a vowel, the word bu is reduced to b. For
example:
- Bha mi na b' àirde na mo pheathraichean. → I was taller than my sisters.
- B' e mi a b' àirde. → I was the tallest.
Welsh is
similar to English in many respects. The ending -af is added onto
regular adjectives in a similar manner to the English -est, and
with (most) long words -mwyaf precedes it, as in the English most.
Also, many of the commonest adjectives are irregular. Unlike
English, however, when comparing just two things, the superlative
must be used, e.g. of two people - John ydy'r talaf (John is the
tallest).
See also
References
worst in Danish: Superlativ
worst in Spanish: Superlativo
worst in Esperanto: Superlativo
worst in Galician: Superlativo
worst in Icelandic: Efsta stig
worst in Simple English: Superlative
worst in Finnish: Superlatiivi
worst in Swedish: Superlativ