[syn: fatal, fateful]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Fateful \Fate"ful\, a. .
Having the power of serving or accomplishing fate. "The
fateful steel." --J. Barlow.
[1913 Webster]
2. Significant of fate; ominous.
[1913 Webster]
The fateful cawings of the crow. --Longfellow.
-- Fate"ful*ly, adv.- Fate"ful*ness, n.
[1913 Webster]
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):
fateful
adj 1: having momentous consequences; of decisive importance;
"that fateful meeting of the U.N. when...it declared war
on North Korea"- Saturday Rev; "the fatal day of the
election finally arrived" [syn: fateful, fatal]
2: ominously prophetic [syn: fateful, foreboding(a),
portentous]
3: (of events) having extremely unfortunate or dire
consequences; bringing ruin; "the stock market crashed on
Black Friday"; "a calamitous defeat"; "the battle was a
disastrous end to a disastrous campaign"; "such doctrines, if
true, would be absolutely fatal to my theory"- Charles
Darwin; "it is fatal to enter any war without the will to win
it"- Douglas MacArthur; "a fateful error" [syn: black,
calamitous, disastrous, fatal, fateful]
4: controlled or decreed by fate; predetermined; "a fatal series
of events" [syn: fatal, fateful]