lugubrious

UK/luːˈɡ(j)uː.bɹi.əs/US/ləˈɡ(j)u.bɹi.əs/

adjectiveC2Rare in speech; mostly a word you read · #14,478 of 15,258neutral

Lugubrious means mournful in a heavy and rather comic way. A lugubrious face, a lugubrious tone.

The comedy is in the excess, since a truly sad person is not called lugubrious. It suits bloodhounds, undertakers in films and anybody who enjoys their own gloom.

Definitions of lugubrious

1adjectivelugubriousMournful in a heavy and rather comic way.C2
“He gave a lugubrious account of the weather.”

lugubrious is a quality.

Remember it

luGUBrious → a face dripping GLUE, sad past the point of sense

The dog's face hangs down as if somebody had poured glue on it, so slow and so sad about nothing that you want to laugh.

hooks ontoglue

Where it comes from

Latin lugubris, mournful, from lugere, to mourn.

Latin
lūgubris — mournful; gloomy
English, today
lugubrious

Latin lūgubris (“mournful; gloomy”), with the suffix -ious.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practise this word

lugubrious in the wild

On this day, keys were thrown into a fire for good luck in a very solemn and lugubrious manner.
Portunus (mythology)
When asked what he thought of the new Lotus 40, Ginther, a lugubrious Californian, said, "Same as the 30 but with ten more mistakes".
Lotus 30
John Slater was an English character actor who usually portrayed lugubrious, amiable cockney types.
John Slater (actor)
Lester's gloomy stage persona was seen to its quintessential comic effect in the long-running musical The Arcadians in which he delivered optimistic lyrics in a lugubrious manner.
Alfred Lester
A long face and prominent nose gave him a lugubrious appearance.
Fred Webb

1 / 2

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

← Vocabulary