sadden

present singular third person saddens · participle present saddening · participle past saddened · past saddened

1. transitiveTo make sad or unhappy.

   I was saddened that you felt so little for me.

   2 more examples

   It saddens me to think that I might have hurt someone.

   The turmoil went on—no rest, no peace. […] It was nearly eleven o'clock now, and he strolled out again. In the little fair created by the costers' barrows the evening only seemed beginning; and the naphtha flares made one's eyes ache, the men's voices grated harshly, and the girls' faces saddened one.

   1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter VII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC

   Synonyms: deject, depress

2. intransitiverareTo become sad or unhappy.

   Hyacinth perfume tickled her senses, making her feel giddy, but she saddened when she saw how uncared for the garden was.

   1999, Mary Ann Mitchell, Drawn To The Grave

   1 more example

   He saddens, all the magic light ⁠Dies off at once from bower and hall, ⁠And all the place is dark, and all The chambers emptied of delight: […]

   1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], “Canto VIII”, in In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC

   Synonyms: get a sad on, unhappy, aggrieve, besorrow, condole, darken, engrieve, erme

3. raretransitiveTo darken a color during dyeing.

   Curve (E) is seen at a glance to represent green saddened down to its fifth shade, and reduced with white to its fourth tint.

   1903, Society of Dyers and Colourists, Bradford, Eng. (Yorkshire), The Journal, page 129

   Synonyms: shade, tinge

4. transitiveTo render heavy, hard, or cohesive; to compress or thicken.

   ... the soil below will, instead of being brought up, be trampled and saddened.

   1808, Thomas Batchelor, General View of the Agriculture of the County of Bedford. Drawn Up by Order of the Board of Agriculture, and Internal Improvement. By Thomas Batchelor, Farmer, page 342

   2 more examples

   Marle's binding and sadning of land being the great Prejudice it doth to Clay-lands.

   1707, J[ohn] Mortimer, The Whole Art of Husbandry; or, The Way of Managing and Improving of Land. […], London: […] J[ohn] H[umphreys] for H[enry] Mortlock […], and J[onathan] Robinson […], →OCLC

   […]; the reason why hee left them in the close all the day was, because that hee woulde have the water sattle away, and the growndesomewhat saddened before hee woulde goe to field with them;[…]

   1857, Henry Best, Rural Economy in Yorkshire in 1641: Being the Farming and Account Books of Henry Best, of Elmswell, in the East Riding of the County of York, page 77

   Synonyms: deepen, thicken