Something so awful or disgusting that it deserves to be hated; thoroughly unpleasant or offensive.
From Latin 'detestari' meaning 'to curse or execrate,' combining 'de-' (down, against) and 'testari' (to call to witness), so literally 'to call down curses upon.'
The word originally meant calling down the gods as witnesses to your hatred—so when we call something 'detestable,' we're echoing an ancient Roman practice of formal cursing.
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