Bestial means savagely cruel, like an animal. Bestial cruelty, a bestial attack, bestial behaviour.
The comparison is unfair to animals, which rarely do anything of the kind — the word says more about how humans have thought about beasts than about beasts. It is strong and formal. Note beast, from the Latin bestia, and that bestiary names a medieval book of animals.
1adjectivebestialSavagely cruel, like an animal.
“The court heard of the bestial treatment of prisoners in the camp.”
synonyms: brutal, savage
bestial is a quality of cruelty.
Latin bestialis comes from bestia, a beast. Beast and bestiary come from the same animal.
Latin
bēstiālis
Old French
bestial
Middle English
bestial
English, today
bestial
From Middle English bestial, from Old French bestial, from Latin bēstiālis, from Latin bēstia (“beast”) (whence English beast).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA