glee
Plural: glees
Noun
- Great delight, especially from someone else's misfortune.
- great merriment
- malicious satisfaction
- Joy; happiness; great delight, especially from one's own good fortune or from another's misfortune.
- Music; minstrelsy; entertainment.
- An unaccompanied part song for three or more solo voices, not necessarily merry.
Verb
- To sing a glee (unaccompanied part song).
Examples
- The glee on her face was palpable as she laid down her bingo, knowing she’d won.
Origin / Etymology
From Middle English gle, from Old English glēo, glīġ, glēow, glīw (“glee, pleasure, mirth, play, sport; music; mockery”), from Proto-West Germanic *glīw, from Proto-Germanic *glīwą (“joy, mirth”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰlew- (“to joke, make fun, enjoy”).
Cognate with Scots gle, glie, glew (“game, play, sport, mirth, joy, rejoicing, entertainment, melody, music”), Icelandic glý (“joy, glee, gladness”), Ancient Greek χλεύη (khleúē, “joke, jest, scorn”). A poetic word in Middle English, the word was obsolete by 1500, but revived late 18c.
Synonyms
gleefulness, gloat, gloating, hilarity, mirth, mirthfulness, blitheness, blithesomeness, cheerfulness, cheeriness, contentedness, contentness, delight, delightedness, elatedness, elation, exuberance, exuberantness, felicity, gaiety, gayfulness, gayness, gladness, gladsomeness, glee, gleesomeness, happiness, high spirits, jolliness, jollity, joviality, jovialness, joy, joyfulness, joyousness, liss, merriment, merriness, pleasedness
Scrabble Score: 5
glee: valid Scrabble (US) TWL Wordglee: valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
glee: valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary