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Heinous vs Savage - What's the difference?

heinous | savage |

As an adjective heinous

is totally reprehensible.

As a proper noun savage is

.

heinous

English

Adjective

(en adjective)
  • Totally reprehensible.
    • I hope they catch the person responsible for that heinous crime.
    The perpetrators of this heinous act must be brought to justice.
    The government denounced the attack as the most heinous of the last decade.
    Political Leaders from around the world have condemned these heinous acts.
    In our public services sorry seems to be the most heinous word.

    Usage notes

    * Nouns to which "heinous" is often applied: crime, act, sin, murder, offence.

    Synonyms

    * (totally reprehensible) abominable, horrible, odious

    Anagrams

    * English words not following the I before E except after C rule

    savage

    English

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • wild; not cultivated
    • a savage wilderness
  • * Dryden
    • savage berries of the wood
  • barbaric; not civilized
    • savage manners
  • * 1719-
    • I observed a place where there had been a fire made, and a circle dug in the earth, like a cockpit, where I supposed the savage wretches had sat down to their human feastings upon the bodies of their fellow-creatures.
  • * E. D. Griffin
    • What nation, since the commencement of the Christian era, ever rose from savage to civilized without Christianity?
  • fierce and ferocious
    • savage beasts
    a savage spirit
  • brutal, vicious or merciless
    • He gave the dog a savage kick.
    The woman was killed in a savage manner.
  • (UK, slang) unpleasant or unfair
    • - I'll see you in detention.
    - Ah, savage !

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (pejorative) An uncivilized or feral human; a barbarian.
  • * 1847 , , Tancred: or The New Crusade , page 251
    • 'Well, my lord, I don't know,' said Freeman with a sort of jolly sneer; 'we have been dining with the savages'.'
    'They are not '     savages     , Freeman.'
    'Well, my lord, they have not much more clothes, anyhow; and as for knives and forks, there is not such a thing known.'
  • (figuratively) A defiant person.

    • Verb

    (transitive)
  • To attack or assault someone or something ferociously or without restraint.
  • (figuratively) To criticise vehemently.
  • *{{quote-magazine, date=2013-08-10, volume=408, issue=8848, magazine=(The Economist), author=Lexington
    • , title= Keeping the mighty honest , passage=British journalists shun complete respectability, feeling a duty to be ready to savage the mighty, or rummage through their bins. Elsewhere in Europe, government contracts and subsidies ensure that press barons will only defy the mighty so far.}}
  • (of an animal) To attack with the teeth.
  • (obsolete) To make savage.
  • * South
    • Its bloodhounds, savaged by a cross of wolf.

    Anagrams

    *