Awesome vs awful

[72doug2,2S]

How does one become great having some of the awe, but being full of awe is the opposite?

Any thoughts?

[ckissick]

Found this on the web:

"The words have been around hundreds and hundreds of years. While they were constructed by combining awe with -ful or -some, once they became lexical items as complete words, their meaning was able to drift like any other lexical item — the fact that each word is composed of a stem and suffix doesn't stop this. (Also, bear in mind that -some, the suffix, doesn't mean "some of X", it means "having the quality of X". Think fearsome, loathsome, cumbersome. And -ful is basically the same as -some in its meaning, with all words.)

Originally, awful had the meaning of being awe-inspiring (including positive connotations), as well as "worthy of, or commanding, profound respect or reverential fear." It was not a far stretch to then use it also to mean "Causing dread; terrible, dreadful, appalling." The earliest records of these uses date back to at least 1000 AD. Between 1000 and 1800, the word evolved to the current meaning: "Frightful, very ugly, monstrous; and hence as a mere intensive deriving its sense from the context = Exceedingly bad, great, long, etc."

Awesome came around much later than awful. It is first recorded in 1598, after awful had been around hundreds of years. Perhaps the need for this word arose because awful had already taken on such a strong negative connotation by this time. So awesome stepped in to again have the meaning of "awe-inspiring", but without the strong negative connotations. Ultimately, in the mid-1900s, the word awesome went from awe-inspiring to its more common use today: "amazing, great, etc."

So, this is how the words ended up like this. Yes, you do have to memorize the words to some extent, because they have certain connotations and colloquial meanings that are extremely common. But, again, part of the problem is treating -some like some. None of the -some words have a connection to the current meaning of some."

[Porsche-O-Phile]

English is really a fairly ugly language. It's got a lot of exceptions and violations of the rules, not to mention a rapidly evolving vernacular and colloquial expressions. I've heard from several friends who have other languages as their first that English is extremely hard to learn because of all the nuances and exceptions, then even harder to become functional / fluent in due to regional dialects and colloquialisms.

On this subject of "awful" = "awe" + "full" I think the etymology is pretty straightforward. One can be in awe of something that's terrible, bad or rotten just as much as they can be in awe of something wondrous, positive or great. It's interesting that the word "awful" doesn't capture this duality and only goes to the negative. It's even more interesting (and confusing) that "awesome" (used for positive things) breaks down to mean "some" + "awe", so the language implies that negative things ("awe" + "full") carry more weight or have more impact than positive ones ("awe" + "some").

English is a mess, it really is.