dire vs frightful

dire

adj
  • Bad in quality, awful, terrible. 

  • Warning of bad consequences: ill-boding; portentous. 

  • Expressing bad consequences: dreadful; dismal. 

  • Requiring action to prevent bad consequences: urgent, pressing. 

frightful

adj
  • Unpleasant, dreadful, awful (also used as an intensifier). 

  • Genuinely horrific, awful, or alarming. 

adv
  • Frightfully; very. 

How often have the words dire and frightful occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )