Extremely disturbing, shocking, or horrifying to look at, usually involving death or injury.
Gruesome comes from Scandinavian origins (Swedish 'grysa' meaning to shudder), combined with the English suffix '-some'. It entered English in the 1600s to describe things that cause horror or disgust.
Gruesome was relatively rare until horror movies and thriller novels made it trendy—before the 1970s, people were more likely to use 'ghastly' or 'hideous', but gruesome perfectly captures that specific shudder-inducing quality!
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