Word.ws English Dictionary

overwell

overwell adverb: overly well.

Adverb

overwell (comparative more overwell, superlative most overwell)

  1. Overly well.
    • I remember my father saying that a wise man should always mistrust a girl who kisses overwell.1899, Samuel Rutherford Crockett ·, The Black Douglas, page 127
    • In my own case, as I was saying, I not only pay the fare of my clerk and his family from Colorado, but I have had an assistant with him constantly since I have been here, and a great deal of the time I have had a third assistant, and yet I have not felt myself overwell served, though I have the...1911, United States. Congress, Congressional Record, page 418

Adjective

overwell (comparative more overwell, superlative most overwell)

  1. Overly healthy and robust.
    • I don't think him overwell. He is more worried than I like to see him by his small enemies – the fleas of Farringford- Woodford.1988, Henry Graham Dakyns, Audrey Tennyson, Lady Audrey Georgina Florence Boyle Tennyson, Letters to a Tutor, page 24
    • Shankaran is not overwell. Mira seems to have become ill on the high altitude and is due in Birla House tomorrow.2000, Mahatma Gandhi, The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi - Volume 76, page 35

Verb

overwell (third-person singular simple present overwells, present participle overwelling, simple past and past participle overwelled)

  1. To overflow.
    • Then sit in silence down, and brooding dwell, Through the slow years, on all we loved, and tell Each tone, each look of love, each syllable, With lips that work, with eyes that overwell!1864, Frederick Goddard Tuckerman, Poems, page 218
    • Then, after going round a little, with surprise of daylight, the water overwelled the edge, and softly went through lines of light to shadows and an untold bourne.1869, R[ichard] D[oddridge] Blackmore, chapter XIX, in Lorna Doone: A Romance of Exmoor. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Sampson Low, Son, & Marston, […], →OCLC
  2. To experience such strong emotion that it cannot be contained.
    • How his heart so proudly overwells!1906, Private Concerts, page 19
    • When he himself has stubbed a toe, The other overwells with woe.1946, Robert Peter Tristram Coffin, Poems for a Son with Wings, page 86
  3. To fill with a crescendo of sound.
    • The heavy-throated cannon-song of battle boomed and swelled, Roared louder, lifted mightier, overwelled!1898 May, Edwin Ford Piper, “Poem”, in The Kiote, volume 1, number 4, page 85
    • Thorns sing a carol of Soft May-snows; The young laburnum Overwells, With peals of bloom from Inaudible bells;1902, Roden Noel, The Collected Poems of Roden Noel, page 354
  4. To flow over; to overrun.
    • The flames overwelled and he made a dash for the door where this Kodizia was grunting like a pig.1991, Ositadinma Adeolu Nnanyelugo Olusanya Ike, Surprise Party: An Anthology of Short Stories, page 60
    • The crowds on the street that night were overwelling and it was a variable sea of black and everybody was there, Red Rolly, Bertah from Biloxi, Arty Shaw, Wild Bill Latura, Chuck the Knife, Axle Concertina, Styx, Sam, all the women you ever bedded, your cousin Lampedusa, the Greenville Gang, and...2019, Bryan Furuness, My Name Was Never Frankenstein

Examples of overwell in a sentence

  • Shishaldin on Unimak Island was "flaming high" May 28, 1929, and glowing matter overwelled the edge of the crater and rolled down the slopes;1932 March 2, The Volcano Letter, page 267:
  • My heart overwelled just to look at her.1965, Warren Miller, The Siege of Harlem, page 34:
  • May we look to those wild places of contradiction where we are at once overwelling with the sweet nectar of hope and cracked by the driest apathy and dusty hopelessness.2020, Danielle Dulsky, Seasons of Moon and Flame, page 302:
  • As an artist Norm was overwelled by the colors, Kathy just stood silently taking at all in.2022, Jay Fullum ·, IALFs, Humans, and RAHs, page 295:

Forms of overwell

Adverb
comparativemore overwell
superlativemost overwell
Adjective
comparativemore overwell
superlativemost overwell
Verb
third-person singular presentoverwells
present participleoverwelling
past participleoverwelled
pastoverwelled

Origin of overwell

From over- + well.

Questions about overwell

What does overwell mean?
Overwell means overly well.
How do you use overwell in a sentence?
Shishaldin on Unimak Island was "flaming high" May 28, 1929, and glowing matter overwelled the edge of the crater and rolled down the slopes;
What part of speech is overwell?
Overwell can be an adverb, an adjective or a verb.

Words near overwell in the dictionary

  1. overweighted
  2. overweightedness
  3. overweighting
  4. overweightness
  5. overweights
  6. overwell
  7. overwelled
  8. overwelling
  9. overwells
  10. overwent
  11. overwept

Source and license

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