MORTAL | meaning in the Cambridge English Dictionary

mortal

adjective

  literary uk /ˈmɔː.təl/ us /ˈmɔːr.t̬əl/

(of living things, especially people) unable to continue living for ever; having to die:

For all men are mortal.

Compare

immortal adjective

causing death:

a mortal injury/illness

men engaged in mortal combat (= fighting until one of them dies)

figurative New computing technology dealt a mortal blow to the printing companies.

Compare

lethal

 mortal dread/fear/terror

extreme anxiety about or fear of someone or something:

We live in mortal dread of further attacks.

 mortal enemy, danger, threat, etc.

a very serious and dangerous enemy, danger, threat, etc.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Death and dying

• bereave
• beyond the grave idiom
• bite
• bleed out
• buy the farm idiom
• cadaveric
• casualty
• croak
• death throes
• decease
• demise
• die off
• lose
• meet your maker idiom
• necrophilia
• peace
• rigor mortis
• starving
• stone-dead
• strike