atrocious adj.

1530s, "enormous wickedness," from French atrocité or directly from Latin atrocitatem (nominative atrocitas) "cruelty, fierceness, harshness," noun of quality from atrox "fierce, cruel, frightful," from PIE *atro-ek-, from root *ater- "fire" + root *okw- "to see;" thus "of fiery or threatening appearance." The meaning "atrocious deed" is from 1793.

word-forming element making adjectives from nouns, meaning "having, full of, having to do with, doing, inclined to," from Old French -ous, -eux, from Latin -osus (compare -ose (1)). In chemistry, "having a lower valence than forms expressed in -ic."

*āter-, Proto-Indo-European root meaning "fire." It forms all or part of: atrabiliary; atrabilious; atrium; atrocious.

It is the hypothetical source of/evidence for its existence is provided by: Old Persian atar "fire;" Latin ater "black" ("blackened by fire"), atrox "frightful" ("of fiery or threatening appearance").