bleak

Meanings

Adjective

• Without color; pale; pallid.
• Desolate and exposed; swept by cold winds.
• Unhappy; cheerless; miserable; emotionally desolate.

Noun

• A small European river fish (Alburnus alburnus), of the family Cyprinidae.

Related

Similar words

• ablet
• alburn
• blay

Origin

• From Middle English bleke (also bleche > English bleach), and bleike (due to Old Norse), and earlier Middle English blak, blac, from Old English blǣc, blǣċ, blāc and Old Norse bleikr ("pale, whitish"), from Proto-Germanic *blaikaz ("pale, shining"). Cognate with Dutch bleek ("pale, wan, pallid"), Low German blek ("pale"), German bleich ("pale, wan, sallow"), Danish bleg ("pale"), Swedish blek ("pale, pallid"), Norwegian Bokmål bleik, blek, Norwegian Nynorsk bleik ("pale"), Faroese bleikur ("pale"), Icelandic bleikur ("pale, pink").
• From Middle English bleke, perhaps an alteration (due to English ang or Old Norse bleikja) of Old English blǣġe; or perhaps from a diminutive of Middle English *bleye, equivalent to blay + -ock or blay + -kin. See blay.