Other forms: mightiest, mightier
Mighty means having great power and strength. A mighty river, a mighty army, the mighty oak.
It is a grand, slightly old-fashioned word and belongs to storytelling, hymns and sports commentary rather than to conversation. Powerful is the everyday equivalent. In American informal English mighty is also an intensifier meaning very — mighty fine, mighty cold — which is regional and dated elsewhere. Note how the mighty have fallen, a fixed phrase from the Bible, and high and mighty, meaning arrogant.
1adjectivemightyHaving great power or size.
“The mighty river drops nine hundred feet in a mile.”
synonyms: powerful, formidable
2adverbuseVery, in American informal use.
“That is mighty kind of you.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
mighty is a degree of power.
Also accepted in games: powerful
Old English mihtig comes from miht, power — the same root as may, in the sense of being able, and the German Macht. Might and may are the same word split in two, which is why might is both a noun meaning power and the past of may.
Proto-Indo-European
*megʰ-
Proto-Germanic
*mahtīgaz — mighty
Proto-West Germanic
*mahtīg — mighty
Old English
mihtiġ
Middle English
mighty
English, today
mighty
Built from
From Middle English mighty, mightie, mighti, myghty, miȝty, maȝty, from Old English mihtiġ, mehtiġ, meahtiġ, mæhtiġ (“mighty”), from Proto-West Germanic mahtīg (“mighty”), from Proto-Germanic mahtīgaz (“mighty”), equivalent to might + -y. Cognate with Scots michty, mychty, stq machtich, Dutch machtig, German Low German machtig, German mächtig, Swedish mäktig.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA