odious

Borrowed from Anglo-Norman, from Old French odieus, from Latin odiōsus, from odium (“hate”).

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈəʊ.di.əs/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈoʊ.di.əs/

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• Rhymes: -əʊdiəs

odious (comparative more odious, superlative most odious)

1. Arousing or meriting strong dislike, aversion, or intense displeasure.

   Scrubbing the toilet is an odious task.

   • 1903, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, “The Adventure of the Solitary Cyclist”, in The Return of Sherlock Holmes‎^Wikisource:

     "He was a dreadful person, a bully to everyone else, but to me something infinitely worse. He made odious love to me, boasted of his wealth, said that if I married him I would have the finest diamonds in London, and finally, when I would have nothing to do with him, he seized me in his arms one day after dinner -- he was hideously strong -- and he swore that he would not let me go until I had kissed him."

   • 1818, Mary Shelley, chapter 6, in Frankenstein‎:

     He looks upon study as an odious fetter; his time is spent in the open air, climbing the hills or rowing on the lake.

   • 1750, Thomas Morell (lyrics), George Frideric Handel (music), “'Theodora'”‎:

     I own no crime, unless it be a crime to've hindered you from perpetrating that which would have made you odious to mankind, at least the fairest half.

• Nouns to which "odious" is often applied: debt, man, character, crime, task, comparison, woman, person, vice, word, act.

• detestable, hated, reviled, unsavory, contemptible, despicable

• iodous