Hello, you have come here looking for the meaning of the word downcast. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word downcast, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say downcast in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word downcast you have here. The definition of the word downcast will help you to be more precise and correct when speaking or writing your texts. Knowing the definition ofdowncast, as well as those of other words, enriches your vocabulary and provides you with more and better linguistic resources.
The adjective is derived from Middle Englishdoun-casten, *adoun-casten(“(adjective) cast down, dejected; (verb) to break down (something); to overcome (someone); to overturn (something)”), from down(“in a downward direction; (figurative) to destruction”),[1]adoun(“downward”)[2] + casten(“to throw (something), fling, hurl; to overcome (someone), defeat, overpower; ”)[3] (from Old Norsekasta(“to cast, throw”), from Proto-Germanic*kastōną(“to throw”), from *kas-(“to throw, toss; to bring up”); further etymology uncertain), modelled similarly to other constructions in Middle English such as adoun-throwen(“to throw down”) and adoun-werpen(“to throw down”)). The English word is analysable as down-(prefix meaning ‘lower direction or position’) + cast(“that has been thrown”, adjective).[4]
Briefly then heere Dido, with downe caſt phiſnomie, parled.
, George Herbert, “The Church Militant”, in [Nicholas Ferrar], editor, The Temple. Sacred Poems, and Private Ejaculations, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Thomas Buck and Roger Daniel; and are to be sold by Francis Green,, →OCLC, page 186:
[A]s before Empire and Arts made vvay, / (For no leſſe Harbingers vvould ſerve then they) / So they might ſtill, and point us out the place / VVhere firſt the Church ſhould raiſe her dovvn-caſt face.
VVhile Thy abandon'd Tribes ſhall only knovv / A diff'rent Maſter, and a Change of VVoe: / VVith dovvn-caſt Eye-lids, and vvith Looks a-ghaſt, / Shall dread the Future, or bevvail the Paſt.
a.1722 (date written), Matthew Prior, “A Pastoral. To Dr. [Francis] Turner, Bishop of Ely, on His Departure from Cambridge.”, in The Poetical Works of Matthew Prior, volume II, London: W Strahan,, published 1779, →OCLC, page 107:
Suppreſs your ſigh, your dovvn-caſt eyelids raiſe, / VVhom preſent you revere, him abſent praiſe.
[T]hat dovvn-caſt Countenance vvhich betrays the Man, vvho, after a ſtrong Conflict betvveen Virtue and Vice, hath ſurrendered his Mind to the latter, and is diſcovered in his firſt Treachery; […]
And yet I should have dearly liked, I own, to have touched her lips; to have questioned her, that she might have opened them; to have looked upon the lashes of her downcast eyes, and never raised a blush; […]
1887, John Ruskin, “The Simplon”, in Præterita. Outlines of Scenes and Thoughts Perhaps Worthy of Memory in My Past Life, volume II, Orpington, Kent: George Allen, →OCLC, page 174:
But Gordon's downcast mien did not change; and I had to admit myself, when supper-time came, that one might almost as hopelessly have sopped the Matterhorn as the loaf.
VVhere liues all vvoe? conduct him to vs three, / The dovvne-caſt ruines of calamitie.
1691, N[ahum] Tate, A Poem, Occasioned by His Majesty’s Voyage to Holland, the Congress at the Hague, and Present Siege of Mons, London: Richard Baldwin,, →OCLC, page 9:
[…]DovvncaſtLucifer revolves his State, / VVith his fall'n Angels ſits in Dark Debate, / And from This Conſtellation bodes his Fate.
I ſavv the reſpectful Dovvncaſt of his Eye, vvhen you catcht him gazing at you during the Muſick: He, I vvarrant, vvas ſurpriz'd, as if he had been taken ſtealing your VVatch. O! the undiſſembled Guilty Look!
And at every such aid, there was a smile to pay; not to mention the downcast of eyes sometimes, and sometimes their uplifting with a soft, sweet light, and the fluttering of lashes in the fresh wind from the sea, and the murmuring of lips, more pink and melodious than any clear Pacific shell.
Macedonian: please add this translation if you can
Etymology 3
From Middle Englishdoun-casten, *adoun-casten(“to cast or throw (something) downwards; to break down (something); to overcome (someone); to overturn (something)”), from down(“in a downward direction; (figurative) to destruction”), adoun(“downward”) + casten(“to throw (something), fling, hurl; to overcome (someone), defeat, overpower; ”): see etymology 1. The English word is analysable as down-(prefix meaning ‘lower direction or position’) + cast(“to throw”, verb).[8]
To cast or throw (something) downwards; also, to drop or lower (something).
1838 October, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, “Midnight Mass for the Dying Year”, in Voices of the Night, Cambridge, Mass.: John Owen, published 1839, →OCLC, stanza 12, page 30:
For there shall come a mightier blast, / There shall be a darker day; / And the stars, from heaven down-cast, / Like red leaves be swept away!