doom

[doom]

noun

1. fate or destiny, especially adverse fate; unavoidable ill fortune.

   In exile and poverty, he met his doom.

2. ruin; death.

   to fall to one's doom.

3. a judgment, decision, or sentence, especially an unfavorable one.

   The judge pronounced the defendant's doom.

   Synonyms: fate, ruination, downfall, destruction

4. the Last Judgment, at the end of the world.

5. Obsolete.,  a statute, enactment, or legal judgment.

verb (used with object)

1. to destine, especially to an adverse fate.

   Synonyms: predestine, foreordain

2. to pronounce judgment against; condemn.

3. to ordain or fix as a sentence or fate.

doom

/ duːm /

noun

1. death or a terrible fate

2. a judgment or decision

3. (sometimes capital) another term for the Last Judgment

verb

1. (tr) to destine or condemn to death or a terrible fate

Other Word Forms

• doomy adjective
• predoom verb (used with object)

Word History and Origins

Origin of doom¹

First recorded before 900; Middle English dome, dōm, Old English dōm “judgment, law”; cognate with Old Norse dōmr, “judgment, sentence, court,” Gothic dōms “sentence, fame,” all from Germanic dômaz “what has been set,” from dôn “to set, place, do ¹ ( def. ) ”; compare Greek thémis “law” (i.e., “what has been set, laid down”); deem

Word History and Origins

Origin of doom¹

Old English dōm; related to Old Norse dōmr judgment, Gothic dōms sentence, Old High German tuom condition, Greek thomos crowd, Sanskrit dhāman custom; see _do ¹ , _deem , _deed , _-dom

Synonym Study

See fate.

Example Sentences

This is why, from Portland, Maine, to Portland, Ore., just about every new post office built since 1962 is concrete and smoked glass—a cold, gray box of doom.

Read more on The Wall Street Journal

It wasn’t an injury or an uncontrollable act that doomed them this time, but rather a rash of discipline errors that came at the worst possible time.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

And still, none of that means the market is necessarily doomed for the next few months.

Read more on Barron's

And still, none of that means the market is necessarily doomed for the next few months.

Read more on Barron's

There is always plenty of doom and gloom to go around in the financial media.

Read more on MarketWatch

Related Words

• calamity 
• cataclysm 
• catastrophe 
• disaster 
• downfall