▪ I. wreckful, a.1
(ˈrɛkfʊl)
[f. wreck n.1 + -ful.]
Causing shipwreck, ruin, or disaster; dangerous, destructive.
| 1596 Spenser F.Q. vi. viii. 36 Straungers..which on their border Were brought..by wreckfull wynde. 1810 Scott Lady of L. v. i, The wreckful storms that cloud the brow of War. 1848 J. C. Mangan Poems (1903) 106 This dull world still slumbers... In a midnight dream, Drifts it down Time's wreckful stream. 1876 Tennyson Harold iii. i. 51 A summer mere with sudden wreckful gusts From a side-gorge. |
▪ II. † ˈwreckful, a.2 Obs.
[f. wreck n.3 + -ful. Cf. wrackful a.1, wrakeful a., wreakful a.]
Full of, manifesting or taking, revenge; marked or characterized by vengeance.
| 1557 North Gueuara's Diall Pr. iv. xvii. (1568) 158 Per force my self dooth straine the wreckfull gods, vouch saue it doo not so. 1601 W. T. Ld. Remy's Civ. Consid. 36 If a man haue to deale with some manner of men which are wreckfull, of a strange nature, hard to please. 1610 Holland Camden's Brit. i. 709 The Earle in wreckfull displeasure..laid his Castle even with the ground. |