EVIL EYE • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Evil eye

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/ˈivəl aɪ/ Listen

adjective

Evil adj.

1.

Having qualities tending to injury and mischief; having a nature or properties which tend to badness; mischievous; not good; worthless or deleterious; poor; as, an evil beast; and evil plant; an evil crop. "A good tree can not bring forth evil fruit."

2.

Having or exhibiting bad moral qualities; morally corrupt; wicked; wrong; vicious; as, evil conduct, thoughts, heart, words, and the like. "Ah, what a sign it is of evil life, When death's approach is seen so terrible."

3.

Producing or threatening sorrow, distress, injury, or calamity; unpropitious; calamitous; as, evil tidings; evil arrows; evil days. "Because he hath brought up an evil name upon a virgin of Israel." "The owl shrieked at thy birth an evil sign." "Evil news rides post, while good news baits."

Evil eye, an eye which inflicts injury by some magical or fascinating influence. It is still believed by the ignorant and superstitious that some persons have the supernatural power of injuring by a look. "It almost led him to believe in the evil eye."

Evil speaking, speaking ill of others; calumny; censoriousness.

The evil one, the Devil; Satan. Note: Evil is sometimes written as the first part of a compound (with or without a hyphen). In many cases the compounding need not be insisted on. Examples: Evil doer or evildoer, evil speaking or evil-speaking, evil worker, evil wishing, evil-hearted, evil-minded.

Synonyms: Mischieveous; pernicious; injurious; hurtful; destructive; wicked; sinful; bad; corrupt; perverse; wrong; vicious; calamitous.

noun

Evil eye n. See Evil eye under Evil, a.

See images of 'Evil eye'

Etymology of 'Evil eye'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Evil eye" Quotes from Famous Books

... these things. The next evening she told me that an old woman had been to the house and asked for me. For days my first wife lurked in the neighborhood, beseeching me to come back to her. But I told her that in the eyes of God she was not my wife. Then, in revenge, she cast the evil eye upon the child—sul bambino—and for six weeks it ailed and then died. Again the witch asked me to go with her, and again I refused. This time she cast her evil eye upon my wife—and Rosina grew pale and sick and took to her bed. There was only one thing to do, you ...

— Courts and Criminals • Arthur Train

... continent, were listened to with the liveliest interest and without the slightest misgiving. She had, moreover, well-settled convictions of her own concerning a number of things which lay beyond Cranbrook's horizon. She had a great dread of the evil eye and knew exactly what remedies to apply in order to counteract its direful effects; she wore around her neck a charm which had been blessed by the pope and which was a sure preventive of rheumatism; and under the ...

— Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen

... for her wealth and hated her for her pride, And when she fell in feeble health, ye blessed her—that she died! How shall the ritual, then, be read?—the requiem how be sung By you—by yours, the evil eye,—by yours, the slanderous tongue That did to death the innocence that died, ...

— Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works • Edgar Allan Poe

... was an exemplification of a strange but universal superstition among the Turks. With these eastern people there is a traditionary belief in what is called the evil eye, answering to the evil spirit that is accredited to exist by more civilized nations. Any human being bereft of reason, or seriously deformed in any way, is held by them to be a protection against the blight ...

— The Circassian Slave; or, The Sultan's Favorite - A Story of Constantinople and the Caucasus • Lieutenant Maturin Murray

... and curious and capricious combinations of pretty much every imaginable thing have all been so used. Birth girdles worn by women in childbirth eased their pain. A circular piece of copper guarded against cholera. A coral was a good guard against the evil eye and sail-cloth from a shipwrecked vessel tied to the right arm was a preventive as well as a cure for epilepsy. There is almost no end to such instances. The list of charms and incantations is quite as curious. There are forms ...

— Modern Religious Cults and Movements • Gaius Glenn Atkins

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