Adjacent Words

Dreary definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

DREARY, a.
1. Dismal; gloomy; as a dreary waste; dreary shades. This word implies both solitude and gloom.
2. Sorrowful; distressing; as dreary shrieks.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: lacking in liveliness or charm or surprise; "her drab personality"; "life was drab compared with the more exciting life style overseas"; "a series of dreary dinner parties" [syn: drab, dreary]
2: causing dejection; "a blue day"; "the dark days of the war"; "a week of rainy depressing weather"; "a disconsolate winter landscape"; "the first dismal dispiriting days of November"; "a dark gloomy day"; "grim rainy weather" [syn: blue, dark, dingy, disconsolate, dismal, gloomy, grim, sorry, drab, drear, dreary]

Merriam Webster's

adjective (drearier; -est) Etymology: Middle English drery, from Old English dr?orig sad, bloody, from dr?or gore; akin to Old High German tr?r?n to be sad, Gothic driusan to fall Date: before 12th century 1. feeling, displaying, or reflecting listlessness or discouragement 2. having nothing likely to provide cheer, comfort, or interest ; gloomy, dismal Synonyms: see dismal • drearily adverb • dreariness noun

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. (drearier, dreariest) dismal, dull, gloomy. Derivatives: drearily adv. dreariness n. Etymology: OE dreorig f. dreor gore: rel. to dreosan to drop f. Gmc

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Dreary Drear"y, a. [Compar. Drearier; superl. Dreariest.] [OE. dreori, dreri, AS. dre['o]rig, sad; akin to G. traurig, and prob. to AS. dre['o]san to fall, Goth. driusan. Cf. Dross, Drear, Drizzle, Drowse.] 1. Sorrowful; distressful. [Obs.] `` Dreary shrieks.'' --Spenser. 2. Exciting cheerless sensations, feelings, or associations; comfortless; dismal; gloomy. `` Dreary shades.'' --Dryden. ``The dreary ground.'' --Prior. Full many a dreary anxious hour. --Keble. Johnson entered on his vocation in the most dreary part of that dreary interval which separated two ages of prosperity. --Macaulay.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(drearier, dreariest) If you describe something as dreary, you mean that it is dull and depressing. ...a dreary little town in the Midwest... = dismal ADJ • drearily ...a drearily familiar scenario. ADV: ADV adj, ADV with v

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

a. 1. Gloomy, dismal, dark, drear, lonely, solitary, lonesome, cheerless, comfortless, chilling, depressing. 2. Monotonous, dull, tiresome, uninteresting.

Moby Thesaurus

Quaker-colored, acier, affecting, afflictive, apocalyptic, arid, ashen, ashy, bad, baleful, banausic, baneful, barren, bitter, black, blah, blank, bleak, bloodless, blue, bodeful, boding, boring, broken-record, canescent, characterless, cheerless, cinereous, cinerous, cold, colorless, comfortless, dapple, dapple-gray, dappled, dappled-gray, dark, dead, deplorable, depressed, depressing, depressive, dim, dingy, dire, discomforting, dismal, dismaying, dispiriting, distressful, distressing, doleful, dolorific, dolorogenic, dolorous, doomful, dove-colored, dove-gray, downcast, drab, draggy, drear, drearisome, dry, dryasdust, dull, dusty, effete, elephantine, empty, etiolated, everlasting, evil, evil-starred, fade, fateful, flat, foreboding, forlorn, funebrial, funereal, glaucescent, glaucous, gloomy, glum, grave, gray, gray-black, gray-brown, gray-colored, gray-drab, gray-green, gray-spotted, gray-toned, gray-white, grayed, grayish, grievous, grim, griseous, grizzle, grizzled, grizzly, harping, heavy, ho-hum, hollow, humdrum, ill, ill-boding, ill-fated, ill-omened, ill-starred, inane, inauspicious, inexcitable, insipid, invariable, iron-gray, jejune, jog-trot, joyless, lamentable, lead-gray, leaden, lifeless, livid, long-winded, low-spirited, lowering, melancholy, menacing, miserable, monotone, monotonous, morose, mournful, mouse-colored, mouse-gray, mousy, moving, of evil portent, ominous, oppressive, ordinary, painful, pale, pallid, pathetic, pearl, pearl-gray, pearly, pedestrian, piteous, pitiable, plodding, poignant, pointless, poky, ponderous, portending, portentous, prolix, prosaic, regrettable, rueful, run-of-the-mill, sad, saddening, saturnine, sharp, silver, silver-gray, silvered, silvery, singsong, sinister, slate-colored, slaty, slow, smoke-gray, smoky, sober, solemn, somber, sombrous, sore, sorrowful, spiritless, steel-gray, steely, sterile, stiff, stodgy, stone-colored, stuffy, superficial, tasteless, taupe, tedious, threatening, tiresome, tiring, touching, treadmill, triste, uncomfortable, uneventful, unexciting, unfavorable, unfortunate, unhappy, uninteresting, unlively, unlucky, unpromising, unpropitious, untoward, unvarying, vapid, weariful, wearisome, weary, wearying, woebegone, woeful, wooden, wretched