mysteriousness

noun

1
as in ambiguity
the quality or state of being impossible to know, understand, or explain the mysteriousness of the nocturnal noises evaporated with the arrival of daybreak

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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in ambiguousness
the quality or state of having a veiled or uncertain meaning the unexpected mysteriousness of the phone message had them a little concerned

Synonyms & Similar Words

Antonyms & Near Antonyms

Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of mysteriousness That intrigue and mysteriousness still rest in the canyon walls today. — Madison Dapcevich, Outside, 13 Sep. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for mysteriousness
  1. ambiguity
  2. mystery
  3. impenetrability
  4. inscrutability
  5. obscurity
  6. darkness
Noun
  • That ambiguity is echoed in Banks’ score, which takes on the tone of a lament and a celebration, frustration and hope, struggle and liberation, the quest for transcendence in the face of the challenges posed by daunting inequities.
    — George Varga, San Diego Union-Tribune, 23 Aug. 2026
  • Internet sleuths, predictably, have seized on this ambiguity as proof of malfeasance.
    — Jessica Winter, New Yorker, 22 Aug. 2026
Definition of ambiguity
Noun
  • The mystery at receiver is which inexperienced player will crack the rotation first after Greathouse, Jordan Faison and Mylan Graham.
    — Pete Sampson, New York Times, 22 Aug. 2026
  • Now, persistent drought has again driven Lake Mead’s water levels to a new historic low this month, drawing back hundreds of miles of shoreline along the Nevada-Arizona border — and more mysteries have already started to surface.
    — Elizabeth Wolfe, CNN Money, 21 Aug. 2026
Definition of mystery
Noun
  • What The Dark Wizard does differently is grapple with Potter’s impenetrability without being able to resolve it, and consider how that indecision might change our perceptions of his life and his May 2015 death while BASE jumping in Yosemite.
    — Roxana Hadadi, Vulture, 7 May 2026
  • Byrne is generous with his time and attention, but there’s also a Warholian air of mystery about him—a gentle impenetrability, a feeling of separateness.
    — Amanda Petrusich, New Yorker, 10 Nov. 2025
Definition of impenetrability
Noun
  • In the same way that audiences are trying to unpack the central scheme — or interlocking set of schemes — at the center of Paula’s newfound predicament, so was the Emmy-winning Maslany drawn to the inscrutability of her character.
    — Natalie Oganesyan, Deadline, 24 May 2026
  • What these critics don’t reckon with enough is that inscrutability is also a feature of the world.
    — Luis Parrales, The Atlantic, 28 Apr. 2026
Definition of inscrutability
Noun
  • The Wiener Werkstätte’s undue obscurity may have something to do with not only those epistolary expressions of skepticism by the founding fathers of the Frankfurt School, but also Hoffmann’s latter-day Nazism, which in this show goes unmentioned.
    — Emily Watlington, ARTnews.com, 24 Aug. 2026
  • Dumped in theaters by Tianjin Yamazaki Film on August 5, the film had zero promotion beyond a single poster design, and initially seemed set to fade quietly into obscurity.
    — Wilson Chapman, IndieWire, 21 Aug. 2026
Definition of obscurity
Noun
  • Superstitious Romans imagined demons lurking in the darkness under the toilet seats.
    — Andrew Coletti, Popular Science, 27 Aug. 2026
  • Overnight from Thursday to Friday, the moon will pass into the shadow of the Earth sending part of the world into total darkness.
    — Irene Wright, USA Today, 27 Aug. 2026
Definition of darkness

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Cite this Entry

“Mysteriousness.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/mysteriousness. Accessed 30 Aug. 2026.

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