Other forms: gloating, gloats, gloated
To gloat is to take open pleasure in somebody else's misfortune. Gloat over the result, stop gloating, gloating openly.
The open part is essential: enjoying it privately is one thing and gloating is doing it where the loser can see. It takes over or about. It is one of the few things nearly every culture agrees is bad manners, whatever the sport.
1verbgloatTo take open pleasure in somebody else's misfortune.
“When his rival lost the election, he couldn't resist gloating on television.”
gloat is a rejoicing.
Probably from Old Norse glotta, to grin scornfully, or a related Old English word.
Proto-Indo-European
*gʰel- — to shine
Proto-Germanic
*glutōną — to stare
Old English
*glotian
Old Norse
glotta — to grin, smile scornfully
Middle English
*gloten
English, today
gloat
Built from
From Middle English gloten, glouten, from Old Norse glotta (“to grin, smile scornfully”) or Old English glotian, both from Proto-Germanic glutōną (“to stare”), from Proto-Indo-European gʰel- (“to shine”), related to dialectal Swedish glotta, glutta (“to peep”), Middle High German glutzen, glotzen (“to stare”), Modern German glotzen (“to gawk, goggle”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA