doleful

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'For doleful are the ghosts, the troops of dead,

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Definitions (8)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (2)

  1. adjective Filled with or expressing grief; mournful. See Synonyms at sad.
  2. adjective Causing grief: a doleful loss.

Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (4)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (1)

Toggle WordNet definitions WordNet (1)

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Examples (50)

  • The doleful-looking Ulrich Mühe is the captain assigned to bug the flat of a dissident playwright (Sebastian Koch) and his girlfriend (Martina Gedeck); listening in on them, he begins to doubt the cause, and his shabby trade. —  Media news, UK and world media comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk
  • The imaginary choir he found reverberating inside his head apparently originated in his love for choral music, whether by Bach or the doleful Estonian Arvo Pärt, and tended to materialise with particular force when Drummond was driving along the M62 in his Land Rover. —  Idolator
  • Like the rain, and the ministerial scandal, it was always with us: a kind of doleful, vulgar resignation that ran very close to the heart of the national psyche. —  The Independent - Frontpage RSS Feed
  • He looked very doleful--for he didn't know what to do. —  The Tale of Daddy Longlegs Tuck-Me-In Tales
  • If she were getting better, why did everyone look so doleful--the doctor, her mother, Miss Bruce--everyone whom she saw? —  Tom and Some Other Girls A Public School Story
 

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This word has been looked up 148 times.

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Related

Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms

Used in the same context Used in the Same Context

plaintive ·  mournful ·  piteous ·  lugubrious ·  dolorous ·  dismal ·  rueful ·  tearful ·  wordless ·  melodious ·  anguished ·  wistful
Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (1)

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (1)

  1. from Middle English doleful, dolful, dulfull, duelful, etc.; from dole + -ful.
 

Pronunciations
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/ˈdoʊlfəl/
by American Heritage

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