merciful
adjUK /ˈmɜː.sɪ.fl̩/ · US /ˈmɝ.sɪ.fl̩/
Etymology From Middle English merciful, mercyful, equivalent to mercy + -ful. Displaced native Old English mildheort.
1
Showing mercy.
- `Listen, Holly. Thou art a good and honest man, and I fain would spare thee; but, oh! it is so hard for woman to be merciful.'1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:
- The murderer, he recalled, had been tried and sentenced to imprisonment for life, but was pardoned by a merciful governor after serving a year of his sentence.1900, Charles W[addell] Chesnutt, chapter I, in The House Behind the Cedars, Boston, Mass.; New York, N.Y.: Houghton, Mifflin and Company […], →OCLC:
- Antonyms
- cruel, inclement, merciless, relentless, unclement, unlenient, unmercied, unmerciful
- Derived terms
- merciful heavens, mercifully, mercifulness, overmerciful, unmerciful
- Related terms
- compassionate, empathetic, forbearing, pitying, sympathetic, tolerant
- Hypernyms
- benevolent, kind
- Hyponyms
- overmerciful