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harrowing

UK/ˈhæɹəʊ.ɪŋ/
adjectiveC1Occasional — familiar, but not everyday · #10,401 of 15,258neutral

Harrowing means deeply distressing to go through or to hear. A harrowing account, harrowing footage, a harrowing experience.

It is stronger than upsetting and is reserved for testimony and images that leave a mark. The metaphor is agricultural: a harrow is a heavy frame of spikes dragged over a field to break the soil up, so a harrowing account tears you over. Note harrow, the implement.

Definitions of harrowing

  1. 1adjectiveharrowingDeeply distressing to go through or to hear.C1

    “She gave a harrowing account of her escape from the burning building.”

    synonyms: distressing, agonising

harrowing is a quality of distress.

Where it comes from

by surface analysis, en + harrow + ing.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Song of Ice and Fire

Practise this word

harrowing in the wild

  • The purpose of harrowing is to break up clods and to provide a soil structure, called tilth, that is suitable for planting seeds.

    Harrow (tool)

  • Coarser harrowing may also be used to remove weeds and to cover seed after sowing.

    Harrow (tool)

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.