overawful
English
Etymology
over- + awful
Adjective
overawful (comparative more overawful, superlative most overawful)
- (obsolete) Excessively awful (awe-inspiring or reverential).
- 1641, John Milton, Animadversions upon the Remonstrants Defence against Smectymnuus; republished in A Complete Collection of the Historical, Political, and Miscellaneous Works of John Milton, […], Amsterdam [actually London: s.n.], 1698, OCLC 926209975:
- free ingenuous minds from an overawful esteem of those more ancient than trusty fathers
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Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for overawful in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913)