to frighten
1frighten — frighten, fright, scare, alarm, terrify, terrorize, startle, affray, affright mean to strike or to fill with fear or dread. Frighten is perhaps the most frequent in use; it is the most inclusive, for it may range in implicaton from a momentary… …
2frighten — [frīt′ n] vt. 1. to cause to feel fright; make suddenly afraid; scare; terrify 2. to force (away, out, or off) or bring ( into a specified condition) by making afraid [to frighten someone into confessing] vi. to become suddenly afraid… …
3frighten into — [phrasal verb] frighten (someone) into (doing something) : to cause (someone) to do (something) because of fear The insurance agent tried to frighten her into buying the most expensive flood insurance. They frightened the boy …
4frighten the life out of someone — frighten the life out of someone/frighten someone to death/informal phrase to make someone feel extremely afraid or nervous The older girls frightened us to death with tales of what would happen to us. Thesaurus: to make someone afraid or… …
5frighten someone to death — frighten the life out of someone/frighten someone to death/informal phrase to make someone feel extremely afraid or nervous The older girls frightened us to death with tales of what would happen to us. Thesaurus: to make someone afraid or… …
6frighten away/off — [phrasal verb] frighten (someone or something) away/off : to cause (someone or something) to go away or stay away because of fear The dog frightened the prowler away. Tourists have been frightened off by the violence in the city. • • • Main Entry …
7frighten out of — [phrasal verb] frighten (someone) out of (doing something) : to keep (someone) from (doing something) because of fear Bad economic news has frightened people out of putting their money in the stock market. • • • Main Entry: ↑frighten …
8frighten somebody to death — frighten/scare sb to ˈdeath idiom to frighten sb very much • Spiders frighten him to death. Main entry: ↑deathidiom …
9frighten — 1660s, from FRIGHT (Cf. fright) + EN (Cf. en) (1). Related: Frightened; frightening. The earlier verb was simply fright (O.E. fyrhtan) to frighten …
10frighten the living daylights out of someone — frighten/scare the (living) daylights out of (someone) to frighten someone very much. Don t come up behind me like that. You scared the living daylights out of me! …
