sorrowful
/ˈsɑɹoʊfəl/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.70 in modern English
15
Scrabble Score
9
Letters
3
Syllables
7
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
exhibiting sorrow; dejected; distraught; sad. (of a person)
Example Sentences
- "sorrowful accident"
- "She threw her arms around the Lion's neck and kissed him, patting his big head tenderly. Then she kissed the Tin Woodman, who was weeping in a way most dangerous to his joints. But she hugged the soft, stuffed body of the Scarecrow in her arms instead of kissing his painted face, and found she was crying herself at this sorrowful parting from her loving comrades."
Etymology
From Middle English sorweful, from Old English sorhful, sorgful (“full of care; anxious; sorrowful”), from Proto-Germanic *surgafullaz (“full of care; anxious”), equivalent to sorrow + -ful. Cognate with Old High German sorgfol (“careful; anxious”), Norwegian sorgfull (“sorrowful”), Icelandic sorgfullur (“lamentable”).
Origin
Word Breakdown
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈsɑɹoʊfəl/
- British English: /ˈsɒɹəʊfəl/
Inflected Forms
more sorrowful (comparative)
most sorrowful (superlative)
sorrowfull (alternative)