heartbreakingadj.
/ˈhɑːtˌbreɪkɪŋ/, U.S. /ˈhɑrtˌbreɪkɪŋ/ That breaks the heart; causing intense sorrow or overwhelming emotional distress; extremely upsetting. Later also: deeply moving; having an intense effect on one's emotions.
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the mind > emotion > suffering > mental anguish or torment > broken-heartedness > [adjective] > that breaks the heart
heartbreak1586
heartbreaking1591
heartbroken1605
heart-rending1621
achy-breaky1992
1591 E. Spenser Teares of Muses in Complaints 6 Making your musick of hart-breaking mone.
1608 T. Dekker Dead Tearme sig. Dv Those passionate heart-breaking vlulations, which (like the ruptures of Thunder) force a continuall passage through thy bosome.
1675 T. Otway Alcibiades ii. i. 16 Distracting Jealousies and fears, Heart-breaking sobs and restless tears.
a1711 T. Ken Wks. (1721) I. 163 Nothing can more Heart-breaking Grief excite, Than utmost Love, repaid with utmost Spite.
1796 F. Burney Camilla V. ix. iv. 90 The heart-breaking event to which it had, ultimately, led.
1845 Southern Literary Messenger 11 671/2 Many a poor exile, a victim of that heart-breaking maladie du pays, has wept away his life in vague pinings, to behold once more his rugged native hills.
1872 T. L. Cuyler Heart Thoughts 106 All the heart-breaking farewells of earth melt into nothing when compared with those leave-takings for an endless eternity.
1903 Success Apr. 234/2 She..gazed dreamily over the still pond, while the boy looked at the heartbreaking beauty of her profile.
1927 Sat. Evening Post 24 Dec. 19/3 There was heart-breaking rivalry among us to secure fraternity pins from the boys who possessed them.
1971 U. K. Le Guin Lathe of Heaven (1973) x. 153 He smiled: again that heartbreaking smile of unmitigated joy.
1998 A. Stephens Drama Queens ii. 58 Most of us can recite the whole heartbreaking story in our sleep.
Derivatives
ˈheartbreakingly adv.
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1685 W. Adams God's Eye on Contrite 38 Our souls should be feelingly and heart-breakingly concerned for those to whom we speak.
1826 J. Porter & A. M. Porter Tales round Winter Hearth (U.S. ed.) 88 She continued to weep violently, heart-breakingly.
1947 R. Taylor Bar Nothing Ranch xvi. 190 She'd cuddle the ranch guitar and croon heartbreakingly.
1986 J. Viorst Necessary Losses viii. 127 And—heartbreakingly—‘If I were a boy, my daddy might have loved me.’
2003 ‘S. Kinsella’ Can you keep Secret? (2004) ii. 29 He looks heartbreakingly handsome.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2013; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
> see also
also refers to : heart-breakingn.
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adj.1591see also