gloom

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English

Etymology

From Middle English *gloom, *glom, from Old English glōm (“gloaming, twilight, darkness”), from Proto-Germanic *glōmaz (“gleam, shimmer, sheen”), from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰley- (“to gleam, shimmer, glow”). Cognate with Scots gloam (“twilight; faint light; dull gleam”), Norwegian glom (“transparent membrane”).

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ɡlum/
  • Audio (US):(file)
  • Rhymes: -uːm

Noun

gloom (usually uncountable, plural glooms)

  1. Darkness, dimness or obscurity.
    the gloom of a forest, or of midnight
    • 1898, J. Meade Falkner, Moonfleet Chapter 4
      Here was a surprise, and a sad one for me, for I perceived that I had slept away a day, and that the sun was setting for another night. And yet it mattered little, for night or daytime there was no light to help me in this horrible place; and though my eyes had grown accustomed to the gloom, I could make out nothing to show me where to work.
  2. A melancholic, depressing or despondent atmosphere.
  3. Cloudiness or heaviness of mind; melancholy; aspect of sorrow; low spirits; dullness.
    • (Can we date this quote by Burke and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
      A sullen gloom and furious disorder prevailed by fits.
  4. A drying oven used in gunpowder manufacture.

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

Verb

gloom (third-person singular simple present glooms, present participle glooming, simple past and past participle gloomed)

  1. (intransitive) To be dark or gloomy.
    • (Can we date this quote by Goldsmith and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
      The black gibbet glooms beside the way.
    • 1891, Mary Noailles Murfree, In the "Stranger People's" Country, Nebraska 2005, p. 189:
      Around all the dark forest gloomed.
  2. (intransitive) to look or feel sad, sullen or despondent.
    • 1882, W. Marshall, Strange Chapman, volume 2, page 170:
      Her face gathers, furrows, glooms; arching eyebrows wrinkle into horizontals, and a tinge of bitterness unsmooths the cheek and robs the lip of sweetened grace. She is evidently perturbed.
    • (Can we date this quote by D. H. Lawrence and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
      Ciss was a big, dark-complexioned, pug-faced young woman who seemed to be glooming about something.
    • 1904, Henry James, The Golden Bowl:
      "Is Maggie then astonishing too?"—and he gloomed out of his window.
  3. (transitive) To render gloomy or dark; to obscure; to darken.
    • (Can we date this quote by Tennyson and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
      A black yew gloomed the stagnant air.
  4. (transitive) To fill with gloom; to make sad, dismal, or sullen.
    • (Can we date this quote by Tennyson and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
      Such a mood as that which lately gloomed your fancy.
    • (Can we date this quote by Goldsmith and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
      What sorrows gloomed that parting day.
  5. To shine or appear obscurely or imperfectly; to glimmer.

Quotations

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