Dictionary

healthful en · ADJ

Pronunciation

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Etymology

From Middle English helthful, helþful, helþeful, equivalent to health + -ful.

Meanings

1. Beneficial to bodily health.
   • The advertisement [published in 1856] concluded with the announcement that the excursion was being run "to afford the industrious classes the opportunity of enjoying the healthful and invigorating sea-breezes of Southport, and the luxury of sea-bathing, or the numerous objects of interest and amusement at Liverpool." 1951 December, “Notes and News: Reduced Fares for Ladies”, in Railway Magazine, pages 852-853:
   • Hockey is an exciting and healthful form of exercise, well suited to college students […] 1906, Princeton Alumni Weekly, volume 7, page 210:
   • A Hindu manual of erotology suggests boiled ghee, drunk in the morning, in the spring time, as a healthful, strengthening beverage. 1961, Harry E. Wedeck, Dictionary of Aphrodisiacs, New York: The Citadel Press, page 104:
2. Conducive to moral or spiritual prosperity; salutary.
   • As he had been thinking for months about leaving his wife and had not done it because it would be too cruel to deprive her of himself, her departure was a very healthful shock. 1926, Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises, Folio Society, published 2008, page 30:
   • She trusted it was a sign that his mind was recovering a more healthful state, that he was not obliged to refer to his imagination, and, by giving her an ideal existence, compel himself to love her as the representative of another; surely, if he could do so long without the real Margarita, and appear cheerful and happy as he used to do when in England, he might (now that death had really taken her, poor thing!) resign her entirely, and love his wife, […] 1842, [anonymous collaborator of Letitia Elizabeth Landon], chapter XXXIII, in Lady Anne Granard; or, Keeping up Appearances. […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 128:
3. (archaic) Synonym of healthy (“evincing health”).
   • His fair hair waved long and freely over a white and unwrinkled forehead: the life of a camp and the suns of Italy had but little embrowned his clear and healthful complexion, which retained much of the bloom of youth. 1835, [Edward Bulwer-Lytton], “The Knight of Provençe, and His Proposal”, in Rienzi, the Last of the Tribunes. […], volume I, London: Saunders and Otley, […], →OCLC, book II (The Revolution), page 184:

Forms

Deriveds

unhealthful · healthfully · healthfulness

Relateds

health · heal · healthy

Synonyms

salutary · wholesome · healthy · salubrious · healthy

Translations (29)

es sano (beneficial to health) · sh zdrȁv (beneficial to health) · cs zdravý (beneficial to health) · lv veselīgs (beneficial to health) · sh здра̏в (beneficial to health) · es saludable (beneficial to health) · ru здоро́вый (beneficial to health) · fi terveellinen (beneficial to health) · bg здравословен (beneficial to health) · lus hrisël (beneficial to health) · la sanus (beneficial to health) · de gesund (beneficial to health) · cy iachusol (beneficial to health) · gl san (beneficial to health) · sl zdrav (beneficial to health) · mk здрав (beneficial to health) · es salutífero (beneficial to health) · gl saudable (beneficial to health) · ru поле́зный для здоро́вья (beneficial to health) · lt sveikatingas (beneficial to health) · cmn 健康 (beneficial to health) · el υγιεινός (beneficial to health) · ja 健康的な (beneficial to health) · ru поле́зный (beneficial to health) · nl gezond (beneficial to health) · fr sain (beneficial to health) · pl zdrowy (beneficial to health) · pt saudável (beneficial to health) · lt sveikas (beneficial to health)