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sorrow

sor·row

UK/ˈsɒɹəʊ/ US/ˈsɑɹoʊ/ common
noun (4) verb (1)

noun

1.

an emotion of great sadness associated with loss or bereavement

  • “he tried to express his sorrow at her loss”
Antonyms
2.

an explanation that results from interpreting something

  • “the report included his interpretation of the forensic evidence”
Synonyms
3.

something that causes great unhappiness

  • “her death was a great grief to John”
Synonyms
4.

the state of being sad

  • “she tired of his perpetual sadness”
Synonyms

verb

1.

feel grief; eat one''s heart out

Synonyms

Origin

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.

Phrases

  • a sorrow shared is a sorrow halved
  • China's Sorrow
  • drown one's sorrows
  • Our Lady of Sorrows
  • shared sorrow is half sorrow
  • tree of sorrow

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WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.