Ill definition
An example of an ill is a natural disaster like a flood.
Ill feeling between rivals.
- Morally bad or wrong; evil.A person of ill repute.
- Causing pain, hardship, etc.; adverse.ill fortune.
- Not kind or friendly; harsh; cruel.ill will.
- Promising trouble; unfavorable; unfortunate; unpropitious.An ill omen.
Your new car is really ill!
Ill deeds committed out of spite.
Holds an ill view of that political group.
The ill effects of a misconceived policy.
- Badly; wrongly; improperly; imperfectly.ill-gotten gains.
- Harshly; cruelly; unkindly.To speak ill of someone.
- (now rare) With annoyance or offense.He took her remarks ill.
They can ill afford to refuse.
I began to feel ill last week.
An ill condition of body and mind.
He suffered from ill treatment.
Ill manners; ill will.
That band was ill.
Music won't solve all the world's ills, but it can make them easier to bear.
An example of ill used as an adverb is the phrase "ill advised" which means given improper or poor advice.
An example of an ill person is someone with pneumonia.
I began to feel ill last week.
An ill condition of body and mind.
The ill effects of a misconceived policy.
Ill predictions.
Ill manners.
My words were ill-chosen.
A statistic that bodes ill for job growth.
We can ill afford another mistake.
The ill that befell the townspeople.
The social ills of urban life.
Please don't speak ill of me when I'm gone.
Ill breeding.
- Anxious or unsure; uneasy:The stranger made me feel ill at ease.
- uneasy; uncomfortable
Other Word Forms
Noun
Adjective
Idioms and Phrasal Verbs
Origin of ill
- Middle English from Old Norse īllr bad
From American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition
- Middle English ille ‘evil, wicked’, from Old Norse illr (adj.), illa (adv.), ilt (noun) (whence Danish ilde), from Proto-Germanic *elhilaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁elḱ- (whence Latin ulcus ‘sore’, Ancient Greek hélkos ‘wound, ulcer’, Sanskrit árśas ‘hemorrhoids’).
From Wiktionary