[1] : The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48

woeful \woe"ful\, woful \wo"ful\, a.
   1. full of woe; sorrowful; distressed with grief or calamity;
      afflicted; wretched; unhappy; sad.
      1913 webster

            how many woeful widows left to bow
            to sad disgrace                      --daniel.
      1913 webster

   2. bringing calamity, distress, or affliction; as, a woeful
      event; woeful want.
      1913 webster

            o woeful day o day of woe           --philips.
      1913 webster

   3. wretched; paltry; miserable; poor.
      1913 webster

            what woeful stuff this madrigal would be --pope.
      1913 webster woefully

[2] : WordNet (r) 2.0

woeful
     adj 1: affected by or full of grief or woe; "his sorrow...made him
            look...haggard and...woebegone"- george du maurier
            syn: woebegone
     2: of very poor quality or condition; "deplorable housing
        conditions in the inner city"; "woeful treatment of the
        accused"; "woeful errors of judgment" syn: deplorable,
        execrable, miserable, wretched
see also:
woebegone deplorable execrable miserable wretched 

[3] : Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0

146 moby thesaurus words for "woeful":
   abominable, affecting, afflictive, aggrieved, anguished, arrant,
   atrocious, awful, base, beastly, beneath contempt, bitter,
   blameworthy, bleak, brutal, calamitous, careworn, cheerless,
   comfortless, contemptible, crushed, cut up, deep-troubled,
   dejected, deplorable, depressed, depressing, depressive, desolate,
   despicable, detestable, dire, discomforting, disconsolate,
   disgusting, dismal, dismaying, dispirited, distressful,
   distressing, doleful, dolorific, dolorogenic, dolorous, downcast,
   downhearted, dreadful, dreary, dumb with grief, egregious,
   enormous, fetid, filthy, flagrant, foul, fulsome, grave,
   grief-stricken, griefful, grieved, grievous, gross, harrowed,
   hateful, heart-stricken, heart-struck, heartbreaking, heartsick,
   heinous, horrible, horrid, in grief, in the dumps, inconsolable,
   infamous, joyless, lamentable, loathsome, lousy, low-spirited,
   lugubrious, miserable, monstrous, mournful, moving, nasty,
   nefarious, noisome, notorious, obnoxious, odious, offensive,
   on the rack, outrageous, overcome, painful, pathetic, piteous,
   pitiable, pitiful, plaintive, plangent, plunged in grief, poignant,
   racked, rank, regrettable, reprehensible, repulsive, rotten,
   rueful, ruthful, sad, saddening, scandalous, schlock, scurvy,
   shabby, shameful, sharp, shocking, shoddy, sordid, sore, sorrowed,
   sorrowful, sorrowing, squalid, stricken, suicidal, tearful,
   terrible, too bad, tortured, touching, unclean, uncomfortable,
   unfortunate, unprecedented, vile, villainous, woebegone, worst,
   worthless, wretched, wrung

Woeful >> W Words
Woeful, definition of term: Woeful
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