fateful means momentous, significant, setting or sealing one’s fate.
fateful is pronounced /ˈfeɪtfəl/.
Why “fateful” is a great word
Having momentous and often decisive significance or consequences, especially as if determined by fate. From fate (from Middle English, from Old French, from Latin fatum, meaning 'that which has been spoken, destiny') + -ful (a suffix meaning 'full of' or 'characterized by'). First recorded in English use c. 1710. Unlike 'fated,' which denotes mere predetermination, or 'portentous,' which signals an ominous forewarning, 'fateful' describes the charged event itself—the knock upon the door that alters every future hour, the envelope slid across a polished table, the silence after a question that cannot be unasked. It is the quiet marker in time where destiny, impersonal and absolute, feels suddenly personal, compressing a life into before and after.
Etymology
From fate + -ful.
adj
- Momentous, significant, setting or sealing one’s fate.e.g.“It started with that fateful trip, history was never the same afterwards.”
- Determined in advance by fate, fated.
Words closest in meaning
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