First Known Use: 14th century
Dictionary
sullen
adjective sul·len \ˈsə-lən\
—used to describe an angry or unhappy person who does not want to talk, smile, etc.
: gray and dark
Full Definition of SULLEN
1
a : gloomily or resentfully silent or repressed <a sullen crowd> b : suggesting a sullen state : lowering <a sullen countenance>
2
: dull or somber in sound or color
4
: moving sluggishly <a sullen river>
— sul·len·ly adverb
— sul·len·ness \ˈsə-lə(n)-nəs\ noun
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Examples of SULLEN
- Economy got you down? Provocateur Ehrenreich … says: Don't try cheering yourself up. … Her sharp, funny critique finds that sunny types don't necessarily live longer or better than grumps. Besides, can you really get rid of all negativity in your life? “It is not so easy,” she notes, “to abandon the whiny toddler or the sullen teenager.” —Richard Eisenberg, People, 26 Oct. 2009
- The skies grew sullen and the air chillier, but it wasn't until the third day that the snow came. —Bill Bryson A Walk In The Woods, 1999
- Despite angry alumni calls and sullen students protests—including the cancellation of all fraternity parties at the school's annual Winter Carnival—the faculty unanimously voted in favor of the college's goal to make fraternities and sororities substantially coed, along with developing new social alternatives for its 4,300 undergraduates. —Anita Hamilton, Time, 1 Mar. 1999
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Origin of SULLEN
Middle English solein solitary, from Anglo-French sulein, solain, perhaps from sol, soul single, sole + -ain after Old French soltain solitary, private, from Late Latin solitaneus, ultimately from Latin solus alone
Related to SULLEN
- Synonyms
- black, bleak, cheerless, chill, Cimmerian, cloudy, cold, comfortless, dark, darkening, depressing, depressive, desolate, dire, disconsolate, dismal, drear, dreary, dreich [chiefly Scottish], elegiac (also elegiacal), forlorn, funereal, glum, godforsaken, gray (also grey), lonely, lonesome, lugubrious, miserable, morbid, morose, murky, plutonian, saturnine, sepulchral, solemn, somber (or sombre), gloomy, sunless, tenebrific, tenebrous, wretched
Synonym Discussion of SULLEN
sullen, glum, morose, surly, sulky, crabbed, saturnine, gloomy mean showing a forbidding or disagreeable mood. sullen implies a silent ill humor and a refusal to be sociable <remained sullen amid the festivities>. glum suggests a silent dispiritedness <a glum candidate left to ponder a stunning defeat>. morose adds to glum an element of bitterness or misanthropy <morose job seekers who are inured to rejection>. surly implies gruffness and sullenness of speech or manner <a typical surly teenager>. sulky suggests childish resentment expressed in peevish sullenness <grew sulky after every spat>. crabbed applies to a forbidding morose harshness of manner <the school's notoriously crabbed headmaster>. saturnine describes a heavy forbidding aspect or suggests a bitter disposition <a saturnine cynic always finding fault>. gloomy implies a depression in mood making for seeming sullenness or glumness <a gloomy mood ushered in by bad news>.
Rhymes with SULLEN
SULLEN Defined for Kids
sullen
adjective sul·len \ˈsə-lən\
Definition of SULLEN for Kids
1
: not sociable : sulky <Laura tried to cheer him up … but he only grew more sullen. — Laura Ingalls Wilder, Little House on the Prairie>
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