Sorrow
name, noun, verb ·Common ·High school level
Definitions
- 1 unhappiness, woe uncountable
"But sorrow that is couch'd in seeming gladness Is like that mirth fate turns to sudden sadness."
- 2 something that causes great unhappiness wordnet
- 3 (usually in plural) An instance or cause of unhappiness. countable
"Parting is such sweet sorrow."
- 4 an emotion of great sadness associated with loss or bereavement wordnet
- 5 sadness associated with some wrong done or some disappointment wordnet
Show 1 more definition
- 6 the state of being sad wordnet
- 1 To feel or express grief. intransitive
"‘Sorrow not, sir,’ says he, ‘like those without hope.’"
- 2 feel grief wordnet
- 3 To feel grief over; to mourn, regret. transitive
"It is impossible to make a man naturally blind, to conceive that he seeth not; impossible to make him desire to see, and sorrow his defect."
- 1 A surname.
Example
More examples"Between astonishment and sorrow, she could not speak a word."
Etymology
From Middle English sorwe, sorow, sorewe, from Old English sorg, sorh (“care, anxiety, sorrow, grief”), from Proto-West Germanic *sorgu, from Proto-Germanic *surgō (compare West Frisian soarch, Dutch zorg, German Sorge, Danish, Swedish and Norwegian sorg), from Proto-Indo-European *swergʰ- (“watch over, worry; be ill, suffer”) (compare Old Irish serg (“sickness”), Tocharian B sark (“sickness”), Lithuanian sirgti (“be sick”), Sanskrit सूर्क्षति (sū́rkṣati, “worry”). Despite the similarity in form and meaning, not historically related to sorry and sore.
Probably a calque of German Sorge (“sorrow”).
Related phrases
More for "sorrow"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.