Aghast means struck with horror at what you see. Stood aghast, aghast at the news, look aghast.
It comes after the verb — somebody is aghast, and there are no aghast people — and it names the moment of shock rather than a settled feeling. Note that the gh spelling was borrowed from ghost, which is unrelated: the word comes from an Old English verb meaning to terrify.
1adjectiveaghastStruck with horror at what you see.
“She stared aghast at the flooded kitchen.”
synonyms: horrified, appalled
aghast is a state of horror.
Middle English agast is the past participle of agasten, to terrify, from Old English gaestan. The gh was copied from ghost.
Old English
a-
Middle English
agast
English, today
aghast
Built from
From Middle English agast, agasted, past participle of agasten (“to terrify”), from Old English a- (compare with Gothic 𐌿𐍃-, German er-, originally meaning "out") + gæstan (“to terrify, torment”): compare Gothic 𐌿𐍃𐌲𐌰𐌹𐍃𐌾𐌰𐌽 (“to terrify”) literally “to fix, to root to the spot with terror”; akin to Latin haerere (“to stick fast, cling”). by surface analysis, a- + ghast/gast. See gaze.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA