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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

gloom.

Darkness, dimness, or obscurity.

5 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ɡluːm/Received-Pronunciation/ɡlum/General-American

  1. Darkness, dimness, or obscurity.

    uncountable · usually
    the gloom of a forest, or of midnight

  2. A depressing, despondent, or melancholic atmosphere.

    uncountable · usually

  3. Cloudiness or heaviness of mind; melancholy; aspect of sorrow; low spirits; dullness.

    uncountable · usually

  4. A drying oven used in gunpowder manufacture.

    uncountable · usually
Where this word comes from

From Middle English *gloom, *glom, from Old English glōm (“gloaming, twilight, darkness”), from Proto-West Germanic *glōm, from Proto-Germanic *glōmaz (“gleam, shimmer, sheen”), from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰley- (“to gleam, shimmer, glow”). The English word is cognate with Norwegian glom (“transparent membrane”), Scots gloam (“twilight; faint light; dull gleam”).

verb/ɡluːm/Received-Pronunciation/ɡlum/General-American

  1. To be dark or gloomy.

    intransitive

  2. To look or feel sad, sullen or despondent.

    intransitive

  3. To render gloomy or dark; to obscure; to darken.

    transitive

  4. To fill with gloom; to make sad, dismal, or sullen.

    transitive

  5. To shine or appear obscurely or imperfectly; to glimmer.

Where this word comes from

From Middle English *gloom, *glom, from Old English glōm (“gloaming, twilight, darkness”), from Proto-West Germanic *glōm, from Proto-Germanic *glōmaz (“gleam, shimmer, sheen”), from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰley- (“to gleam, shimmer, glow”). The English word is cognate with Norwegian glom (“transparent membrane”), Scots gloam (“twilight; faint light; dull gleam”).

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.