sombre

comparative sombrer · superlative sombrest · alternative US somber · alternative US somber

1. CanadaUKDark; gloomy; shadowy, dimly lit.

   The lady led him into a sombre hallway and disappeared. A moment later the windowless chamber was illuminated by the entry of a heavenly creature emitting a radiance prone to pierce the heart of any youth exposed to it.

   2015, Hermann Kauders, Before The Cock Crows, →ISBN, page 9

   1 more example

   All three parallel valleys of the Llynvi, Garw and Ogmore are much the same in physical character: the lower reaches are wooded and not unattractive, but as the railway climbs on ever-steepening grades, the hills on either hand grow barer and closer together, while in all respects the scene becomes more sombre, with the terraced, slate-roofed colliery towns and the road, railway and river all struggling for space in the narrowing defiles.

   1955 July, D. S. Barrie, “Railways of the Bridgend District”, in Railway Magazine, page 449

   Synonyms: bleak, dreary, cheerless, comfortless, bleak, dark, morose, depressing

2. CanadaUKDull or dark in colour or brightness.

   His tall and slender figure, dressed in sombre black, his hair of that peculiar reddish auburn so rarely seen, his flashing black eyes, in which a fitful fire seemed for ever burning; all combined to give something almost of a demoniac air ...

   1877, The Black Band; or, The Mysteries of Midnight, page 47

   Synonyms: fuscous, inky, adumbral, blear, caliginous, cimmerian, crepuscular, dark

3. CanadaUKMelancholic, gloomy, dreary, dismal; grim.

   The dinner was silent and sombre; happily it was also short.

   1845, B[enjamin] Disraeli, Sybil; or The Two Nations. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC

   2 more examples

   It was a wonder that he had not been a victim of the ferocious and summary executions which marked the course of that tyranny; for Guzman had ruled the country with the sombre imbecility of political fanaticism.

   1904 January 29 – October 7, Joseph Conrad, Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard, London; New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers […], published 1904, →OCLC

   A sombre mood, very sombre in fact, thought Hennessey, as he stood against the wall observing the procedure for the police. He had not known a mood more sombre to have previously descended on the room.

   2012, Peter Turnbull, Aftermath, Severn House Publishers Ltd, →ISBN

   Synonyms: despondent, unhappy, atrabiliary, atrabilious, blitheless, dispirited, blue, bummed out

4. CanadaUKGrave; extremely serious.

   a sombre situation

   Synonyms: earnest, staid, austere, frightful, demure, serious, grave, earnest

alternative US somber

1. CanadaUKobsoleteuncountableGloom; obscurity; duskiness.

present singular third person sombres · participle present sombring · participle past sombred · past sombred · alternative US somber

1. CanadaUKTo make sombre or dark; to make shady.