fateful
Americanadjective
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having momentous significance or consequences; decisively important; portentous.
a fateful meeting between the leaders of the two countries.
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fatal, deadly, or disastrous.
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controlled or determined by destiny; inexorable.
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prophetic; ominous.
adjective
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having important consequences; decisively important
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bringing death or disaster
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controlled by or as if by fate
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prophetic
Related Words
See ominous.
Other Word Forms
- fatefully adverb
- fatefulness noun
Etymology
Origin of fateful
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The headpiece had been left by one of the pesky children when they’d come here that fateful All Hallows’ Eve, fallen from one of their costumes.
From Literature
A certain fateful missive brought Holbein to Thomas More, one of Henry VIII’s most trusted advisers.
Not for long — Harry soon receives the fateful letter inviting him to attend Hogwarts.
From Los Angeles Times
Long before Cherny pressed send on that fateful message, Anthropic’s founders had chosen a counterintuitive strategy that would come to define the company.
When players refused to sing the national anthem at a game in Australia, they set in motion a fateful series of events.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
