Word.ws English Dictionary

dismay

/dɪsˈmeɪ/

dismay verb: to cause to feel apprehension; great sadness, or fear; to deprive of energy.

Verb

dismay (third-person singular simple present dismays, present participle dismaying, simple past and past participle dismayed)

  1. To cause to feel apprehension; great sadness, or fear; to deprive of energy.
    • Be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed.1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Josh i:9
    • What words be these? What fears do you dismay?1600, [Torquato Tasso], “(please specify |book=1 to 20)”, in Edward Fairefax [i.e., Edward Fairfax], transl., Godfrey of Bulloigne, or The Recouerie of Ierusalem. […], London: […] Ar[nold] Hatfield...
    Synonyms:
    daunt, appall, terrify
  2. To render lifeless; to subdue; to disquiet.
    • Do not dismay yourself for this.1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book IV, Canto I”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 40
  3. To take dismay or fright; to be filled with dismay.
    • Dismay not, princes, at this accident,1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Sixt”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...

Noun

dismay (uncountable)

  1. A sudden or complete loss of courage and firmness in the face of trouble or danger; overwhelming and disabling terror; a sinking of the spirits
    • He looked in dismay at the destruction of the town caused by the hurricane.
    • Come on: in this there can be no dismay;
      My ships come home a month before the day.c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
    Synonyms:
    consternation
  2. Condition fitted to dismay; ruin.

dismay meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Malayalam

dismay in Tamil

கலை, தள்ளுபடி செய், நீக்கு, பணிநீக்கு

dismay in Urdu

ہیبت, ہمت شکنی, حزن, خوف, ڈرانا, دھمکانا

dismay in Bengali

আতঙ্ক, হতাশা

dismay in Malayalam

അന്ധാളിപ്പിക്കുക, സംഭ്രമിപ്പിക്കുക, വിസ്മയിപ്പിക്കുക, ഞെട്ടിപ്പിക്കുക
More languagesFewer languages
dismay in Kannada
ಅಧೈರ್ಯ, ಎದೆಗುಂದುವಿಕೆ, ನಿರಾಶೆ, ಹತಾಶೆ

Examples of dismay in a sentence

  • To the dismay of his mother, the boy put his finger into the pancake batter.
  • Most feared of all the Unseelie, the Dullahan is a bringer of dismay and death.
  • A number of European governments publicly criticized France to the clear dismay of French leaders.

All 27 example sentences with dismay

Synonyms of dismay

Forms of dismay

third-person singular presentdismays
present participledismaying
past participledismayed
pastdismayed

Past tense of dismay: dismayed

Origin of dismay

From Middle English dismayen, from Anglo-Norman *desmaiier, alteration of Old French esmaier (“to frighten”), probably from Vulgar Latin *exmagare (“to deprive (someone) of strength, to disable”), from ex- + *magare (“to enable, empower”), from Proto-Germanic *maginą, *maganą (“might, power”), from Proto-Indo-European *megʰ- (“to be able”). Akin to Old High German magan, megin (“power, might, main”), Old English mæġen (“might, main”), Old High German magan, mugan (“to be powerful, able”), Old English magan (“to be able”). Cognate with Portuguese desmaiar (“to faint”) and Spanish esmayar. See also Portuguese esmagar, Spanish amagar. More at main, may.

Words formed from dismay

Words that rhyme with dismay

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about dismay

What does dismay mean?
Dismay means to cause to feel apprehension; great sadness, or fear; to deprive of energy.
What is dismay in Tamil?
Dismay in Tamil is கலை, தள்ளுபடி செய், நீக்கு. See Dismay meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is dismay?
Dismay can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce dismay?
Dismay is pronounced /dɪsˈmeɪ/.
What is the past tense of dismay?
The past tense of dismay is dismayed.

Words near dismay in the dictionary

  1. dismasted
  2. dismasting
  3. dismastings
  4. dismastment
  5. dismasts
  6. dismay
  7. dismayd
  8. dismayed
  9. dismayedly
  10. dismayedness
  11. dismayer

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: dismay (page history and authors); dismay (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); dismay (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); Dismay (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); dismay (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); dismay (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-dismay.ogg.

Cite this entry: “dismay.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/dismay. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.