gormless

adjective

gorm·less ˈgȯrm-ləs

Synonyms of gormless next

chiefly British

: lacking intelligence : stupid

gormlessness noun chiefly British

Did you know?

Gormless began life as the English dialect word gaumless, which was altered to the modern spelling when it expanded into wider use in the late 19th century. The origins of gaumless are easy to understand; the word derives from a combination of the dialect noun gaum, meaning "attention" or "understanding," and the suffix -less. This gaum has a related verb, also limited to dialect use, meaning "to pay attention to" and "to understand." Perhaps surprisingly, the four-letter gaum has multiple additional dialectal uses that are etymologically unrelated to these. Also noun-and-verb pairs, gaum means "a sticky or greasy mess" and "to smudge or smear especially with something sticky or greasy," as well as "a stupid doltish person" and "to behave in a stupid or awkward manner." Use of all of these pales in comparison to that of gormless, however, which is most frequently seen in British English.

Examples of gormless in a Sentence

a comedy show that invariably portrays the British aristocracy as a bunch of gormless twits

Recent Examples on the Web Much of the movie unfolds inside the suburban Connecticut mansion where Lily lives with her gormless mother (Francie Swift) and her loathsome stepdad. —

Justin Chang, latimes.com, 8 Mar. 2018

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'gormless.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.