perilous
/ˈpɛrɪləs
/adjective
1Full of danger or risk: a perilous journey south...
- I thus embark on a perilous undertaking, knowing full well that I risk the wrath of both women and men.
- But when the distances are longer and the borders tougher, the journeys become much more perilous.
- The situation was extremely perilous and the patrol was in danger of being wiped out by the heavy crossfire.
Synonyms
dangerous, fraught with danger, hazardous, risky, unsafe, treacherous;
precarious, vulnerable, uncertain, insecure, critical, desperate, exposed, at risk, in jeopardy, in danger, touch-and-go;
problematic, difficult
informal hairy, dicey
North American informal gnarly
archaic or humorous parlous
1.1Exposed to imminent risk of disaster or ruin: the economy is in a perilous state...
- The prospect of mass destruction made real the perilous state of western civilization.
- His financial state is also said to be increasingly perilous.
- We are appalled at the perilous state of the farming and fishing industries.
Derivatives
perilousness
/ noun ...- A visual feast, it brilliantly captures the perilousness of being an animal, and an outsider, in a cruel bipedal world.
- It's difficult to overstate the perilousness of the situation.
- Their perilousness lies in their ordered destructiveness - it is a misuse on a vast scale of the human desire for order - and in the irrationality and incalculability of their pressure for the victory of the revolutionary new order.
Origin
Middle English: from Old French perillous, from Latin periculosus, from periculum 'danger' (see peril).