Word of the Day

Sunday, January 12, 2003

gloaming

\GLOH-ming\ , noun;

Twilight; dusk.

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Quotes:

The children squealed and waved and smiled, their teeth flashing white in the gloaming.

-- Evan Thomas, Robert Kennedy: His Life

It was the gloaming, when a man cannot make out if the nebulous figure he glimpses in the shadows is angel or demon, when the face of evening is stained by red clouds and wounded by lights.

-- Homero Aridjis, 1492: The Life and Times of Juan Cabezon of Castile (translated by Betty Ferber)

Arrived at the village station on a wintry evening, when the gloaming is punctuated by the cheery household lamps, shining here and there like golden stars, through the leafless trees.

-- Margaret Sangster,

Origin:

Gloaming comes from Old English glomung, from glom, "dusk."