Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • intransitive verb To feel or express grief or sorrow. synonym: grieve.
  • intransitive verb To show grief for a death by conventional signs, as by wearing black clothes.
  • intransitive verb To make a low, indistinct, mournful sound. Used especially of a dove.
  • intransitive verb To feel or express deep regret for.
  • intransitive verb To grieve over (someone who has died).
  • intransitive verb To utter sorrowfully.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Sorrow.
  • To express grief or sorrow; grieve; be sorrowful; lament.
  • To display the appearance of grief; wear the customary habiliments of sorrow.
  • Synonyms Grieve, etc. See lament, v. i.
  • To grieve for; lament; bewail; deplore.
  • To convey or express grief for.
  • Sorrowful.
  • To have a kind of malignant glanders: said of a horse, and allusively of persons, in the phrase to mourn of the chine or mourning of the chine. Compare to mose in the chine (under mose), and see mourner.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • intransitive verb To express or to feel grief or sorrow; to grieve; to be sorrowful; to lament; to be in a state of grief or sadness.
  • intransitive verb To wear the customary garb of a mourner.
  • transitive verb To grieve for; to lament; to deplore; to bemoan; to bewail.
  • transitive verb To utter in a mournful manner or voice.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb To express sadness or sorrow for; to grieve over (especially a death).
  • noun now literary Sorrow, grief.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb feel sadness
  • verb observe the customs of mourning after the death of a loved one

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English mournen, from Old English murnan; see (s)mer- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Old English murnan, cognate with French morne ("gloomy").

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Examples

  • To mourn is to express regret and he regrets nothing.

    Think Progress » Strategy Memo: How the Right Plans to Sink the Anti-Torture Amendment Behind Closed Doors 2005

  • To mourn is to (1) feel or express grief or sorrow; (2) to show the customarysigns of grief for a death, to wear mourning clothes; (3) to murmur mournfully; (1) to feel or express grief or sorrow for.

    Making a place in the church for a lamentation 2001

  • WHEREAS, the people of Wisconsin mourn the death of Gunnery Sergeant Richard W. Fischer; and

    Fischer, Richard W. 1968

  • What he had before said he would do (ch.viii. 8) is here repeated, that he would make the land melt and tremble, and all that dwell therein mourn, that the judgment should rise up wholly like a flood, and the country should be drowned, and laid under water, as by the flood of Egypt, v. 5.

    Commentary on the Whole Bible Volume IV (Isaiah to Malachi) 1721

  • What I do mourn is what we lose when by official policy or official neglect we allow, confuse or encourage our soldiers to forget that best sense of ourselves, that which is our greatest strength-that we are different and better than our enemies, that we fight for an idea, not a tribe, not a land, not a king, not a twisted interpretation of an ancient religion, but for an idea that all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with inalienable rights.

    Think Progress » Deal in the works on habeas suspension: 2005

  • (Hebrew: mitsrssyim -- "Egypt") mourn, that is an indication in what high esteem he was held, both as a prince in his own right as well as the father of Joseph.

    Exposition of Genesis: Volume 1 1892-1972 1942

  • "Yea," is thy word to me with the tongue: say it to me with thy mind, and with the word mourn heavily, that thou mayest have continual cheerfulness.

    NPNF1-12. Saint Chrysostom: Homilies on the Epistles of Paul to the Corinthians Editor 1889

  • Hilary: Those that mourn, that is, not loss of kindred, affronts, or losses, but who weep for past sins.

    Catena Aurea - Gospel of Matthew 1225?-1274 1842

  • So, OK, we don't necessarily need to "mourn" our possessions.

    On cluttered spaces unclutterer 2009

  • She broke into a relieved smile to discover I was a virtuous widow and not a disreputable single mother, as I was, and passed the news around, so that the rest of the vacation allowed me to "mourn" while basking in benevolent glances.

    Travel solo, never alone 2010

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