Library / English Dictionary

SCOWL

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

A facial expression of dislike or displeasure

Synonyms:

frown; scowl

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Hypernyms ("scowl" is a kind of...):

facial expression; facial gesture (a gesture executed with the facial muscles)

Derivation:

scowl (frown with displeasure)

 II. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Frown with displeasure

Classified under:

Verbs of grooming, dressing and bodily care

Hypernyms (to "scowl" is one way to...):

frown; glower; lour; lower (look angry or sullen, wrinkle one's forehead, as if to signal disapproval)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Derivation:

scowl (a facial expression of dislike or displeasure)

Credits

 Context examples: 

Walt scowled unconsciously; then his face brightened, and he clapped his hand to his breast pocket.

(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)

He was moody, too; unaccountably so; I more than once, when sent for to read to him, found him sitting in his library alone, with his head bent on his folded arms; and, when he looked up, a morose, almost a malignant, scowl blackened his features.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

It was a sombre evening, with a lurid light in the sky; and as I saw the prospect scowling in the distance, with here and there some larger object starting up into the sullen glare, I fancied it was no inapt companion to the memory of this fierce woman.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

With them also were the pick of the Gascon chivalry—the old Duc d'Armagnac, his nephew Lord d'Albret, brooding and scowling over his wrongs, the giant Oliver de Clisson, the Captal de Buch, pink of knighthood, the sprightly Sir Perducas d'Albret, the red-bearded Lord d'Esparre, and a long train of needy and grasping border nobles, with long pedigrees and short purses, who had come down from their hill-side strongholds, all hungering for the spoils and the ransoms of Spain.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

I almost expected a rebuff for this hardly well-timed question, but, on the contrary, waking out of his scowling abstraction, he turned his eyes towards me, and the shade seemed to clear off his brow.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

I knew Mr. Rochester; though the begrimed face, the disordered dress (his coat hanging loose from one arm, as if it had been almost torn from his back in a scuffle), the desperate and scowling countenance, the rough, bristling hair might well have disguised him.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)