/ɡluːm/, /ɡlum/
OriginFrom 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”).
- uncountable, usuallyDarkness, dimness, or obscurity.
“the gloom of a forest, or of midnight”
“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 li”
“On December 13, Maritime-liveried 66051 powers out of the early morning gloom with three repatriated Class 66s, on the 0809 Dollands Moor Sidings-Scunthorpe Redbourne Siding.”
- uncountable, usuallyA depressing, despondent, or melancholic atmosphere.
“A sudden little river crossed my path / As unexpected as a serpent comes. / No sluggish tide congenial to the glooms— / This, as it frothed by, might have been a bath / For the fiend's glowing hoof—to”
“Although it's always crowded
You still can find some room
For broken-hearted lovers
To cry there in their gloom.”
- uncountable, usuallyCloudiness or heaviness of mind; melancholy; aspect of sorrow; low spirits; dullness.
“A sullen gloom and furious disorder prevailed by fits.”
- uncountable, usuallyA drying oven used in gunpowder manufacture.
- intransitiveTo be dark or gloomy.
“Here, while the proud their long drawn pomps diſplay, / There the black gibbet glooms beſide the way.”
“Around all the dark forest gloomed.”
- intransitiveTo look or feel sad, sullen or despondent.
“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.”
“Ciss was a big, dark-complexioned, pug-faced young woman who seemed to be glooming about something.”
“"Is Maggie then astonishing too?"—and he gloomed out of his window.”
- transitiveTo render gloomy or dark; to obscure; to darken.
“A black yew gloom'd the stagnant air.”
- transitiveTo fill with gloom; to make sad, dismal, or sullen.
“For see you not, dear love, / Such a mood as that, which lately gloom'd / Your fancy when you saw me following you, / Must make me fear still more you are not mine, […]”
“Good Heaven! What ſorrows gloom'd that parting day, / That called them from their native walks away; […]”
- To shine or appear obscurely or imperfectly; to glimmer.
Formsglooms(plural) · glooms(present, singular, third-person) · glooming(participle, present) · gloomed(participle, past) · gloomed(past)