Ill

//ɪl// adj, adv, name, noun, verb, slang

Definitions

Adjective
  1. 1
    Evil; wicked (of people). obsolete

    "St. Paul chose to magnify his office when ill men conspired to lessen it."

  2. 2
    Morally reprehensible (of behaviour etc.); blameworthy. archaic

    "‘Go bring her. It is ill to keep a lady waiting.’"

  3. 3
    Indicative of unkind or malevolent intentions; harsh, cruel.

    "He suffered from ill treatment."

  4. 4
    Unpropitious, unkind, faulty, not up to reasonable standard.

    "ill manners; ill will"

  5. 5
    Unwell in terms of health or physical condition; sick.

    "mentally ill people"

Show 5 more definitions
  1. 6
    Nauseated; having an urge to vomit.

    "Seeing those pictures made me ill."

  2. 7
    Sublime, with the connotation of being so in a singularly creative way. slang

    "This is the illest beat I've ever heard."

  3. 8
    Extremely bad (bad enough to make one ill). Generally used indirectly with to be. slang

    "That band was ill."

  4. 9
    Unwise; not a good idea. dated

    "Oh that when the devil and flesh entice the sinner to sport with and make a mock of sin, Prov. x. 23, he would but consider, it is ill jesting with edged tools, it is ill jesting with unquenchable burnings; […]"

  5. 10
    Bad-tempered. Appalachia
Adjective
  1. 1
    presaging ill fortune wordnet
  2. 2
    distressing wordnet
  3. 3
    resulting in suffering or adversity wordnet
  4. 4
    indicating hostility or enmity wordnet
  5. 5
    affected by an impairment of normal physical or mental function wordnet
Adverb
  1. 1
    Not well; imperfectly, badly

    "Such jealousy ill becomes her; she can ill afford another gaffe like that."

Adverb
  1. 1
    (‘ill’ is often used as a combining form) in a poor or improper or unsatisfactory manner; not well wordnet
  2. 2
    with difficulty or inconvenience; scarcely or hardly wordnet
  3. 3
    unfavorably or with disapproval wordnet
Proper Noun
  1. 1
    A river in France, tributary to the Rhine.
Noun
  1. 1
    Trouble; distress; misfortune; adversity. countable, uncountable

    "Music won't solve all the world's ills, but it can make them easier to bear."

  2. 2
    Initialism of interlibrary loan. abbreviation, alt-of, initialism
  3. 3
    an often persistent bodily disorder or disease; a cause for complaining wordnet
  4. 4
    Harm or injury. countable, uncountable

    "I wouldn't want you to do me ill."

  5. 5
    Evil; moral wrongfulness. countable, uncountable

    "Strong virtue, like strong nature, struggles still, / Exerts itself, and then throws off the ill."

Show 2 more definitions
  1. 6
    A physical ailment; an illness. countable, uncountable

    "I am incapacitated by rheumatism and other ills."

  2. 7
    PCP, phencyclidine. US, slang, uncountable
Verb
  1. 1
    To behave aggressively. dated, intransitive, slang

    "D.M.C.: You been illin' lately. Run: So, I'm illin'. Am I illin'? Chillin'! You know what I'm sayin'? Chillin'."

Etymology

Etymology 1

From Middle English ille (“evil; wicked”), from Old Norse illr (adjective), illa (adverb), ilt (noun), from Proto-Germanic *ilhilaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁elḱ- (whence Latin ulcus (“sore”), Ancient Greek ἕλκος (hélkos, “wound, ulcer”), Sanskrit अर्शस् (árśas, “hemorrhoids”)). Cognates Cognate with Scots and Yola ill, Danish ilde (“bad”), Faroese, Icelandic illur (“bad, ill, wicked”), Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk ille (“bad”), Swedish illa (“badly; poorly”).

Etymology 2

From Middle English ille (“evil; wicked”), from Old Norse illr (adjective), illa (adverb), ilt (noun), from Proto-Germanic *ilhilaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁elḱ- (whence Latin ulcus (“sore”), Ancient Greek ἕλκος (hélkos, “wound, ulcer”), Sanskrit अर्शस् (árśas, “hemorrhoids”)). Cognates Cognate with Scots and Yola ill, Danish ilde (“bad”), Faroese, Icelandic illur (“bad, ill, wicked”), Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk ille (“bad”), Swedish illa (“badly; poorly”).

Etymology 3

From Middle English ille (“evil; wicked”), from Old Norse illr (adjective), illa (adverb), ilt (noun), from Proto-Germanic *ilhilaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁elḱ- (whence Latin ulcus (“sore”), Ancient Greek ἕλκος (hélkos, “wound, ulcer”), Sanskrit अर्शस् (árśas, “hemorrhoids”)). Cognates Cognate with Scots and Yola ill, Danish ilde (“bad”), Faroese, Icelandic illur (“bad, ill, wicked”), Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk ille (“bad”), Swedish illa (“badly; poorly”).

Etymology 4

From Middle English ille (“evil; wicked”), from Old Norse illr (adjective), illa (adverb), ilt (noun), from Proto-Germanic *ilhilaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁elḱ- (whence Latin ulcus (“sore”), Ancient Greek ἕλκος (hélkos, “wound, ulcer”), Sanskrit अर्शस् (árśas, “hemorrhoids”)). Cognates Cognate with Scots and Yola ill, Danish ilde (“bad”), Faroese, Icelandic illur (“bad, ill, wicked”), Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk ille (“bad”), Swedish illa (“badly; poorly”).

Etymology 5

From French Ill.

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