DOWNCAST

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does downcast mean? 

• DOWNCAST (noun)
  The noun DOWNCAST has 1 sense:

1. a ventilation shaft through which air enters a mine

  Familiarity information: DOWNCAST used as a noun is very rare.

• DOWNCAST (adjective)
  The adjective DOWNCAST has 2 senses:

1. directed downward

2. filled with melancholy and despondency

  Familiarity information: DOWNCAST used as an adjective is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• DOWNCAST (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A ventilation shaft through which air enters a mine

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

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

shaft (a long vertical passage sunk into the earth, as for a mine or tunnel)

• DOWNCAST (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Directed downward

Context example:

a downcast glance

Similar:

down (being or moving lower in position or less in some value)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Filled with melancholy and despondency

Synonyms:

blue; depressed; dispirited; down; down in the mouth; downcast; downhearted; gloomy; grim; low; low-spirited

Context example:

feeling discouraged and downhearted

Similar:

dejected (affected or marked by low spirits)

 Context examples 

I could read it from thy reddened cheek and downcast eye.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Turning from the building in a downcast manner, Mr. Micawber accepted my proffered arm on one side, and the proffered arm of Traddles on the other, and walked away between us.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Men more downcast than ever. All said they expected something of the kind, but would not say more than there was something aboard. Mate getting very impatient with them; feared some trouble ahead.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

His fine and lovely eyes were now lighted up with indignation, now subdued to downcast sorrow and quenched in infinite wretchedness.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

"Is that all?" asked Jo, as Mrs. March looked silently at the downcast face of her pretty daughter, and could not find it in her heart to blame her little follies.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

And, when she saw him in the evening, while she worked with her friend, slowly pacing the drawing-room for an hour together in silent thoughtfulness, with downcast eyes and contracted brow, she felt secure from all possibility of wronging him.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

One of whom, having never before understood that Thornton was so soon and so completely to be his home, was pondering with downcast eyes on what it would be not to see Edmund every day; and the other, startled from the agreeable fancies she had been previously indulging on the strength of her brother's description, no longer able, in the picture she had been forming of a future Thornton, to shut out the church, sink the clergyman, and see only the respectable, elegant, modernised, and occasional residence of a man of independent fortune, was considering Sir Thomas, with decided ill-will, as the destroyer of all this, and suffering the more from that involuntary forbearance which his character and manner commanded, and from not daring to relieve herself by a single attempt at throwing ridicule on his cause.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

My spirits sank under these words, and I became very downcast and heavy of heart.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

For a time Sir Nigel was very moody and downcast, with bent brows and eyes upon the pommel of his saddle.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

"Oh, yes! It was very sweet, and I'm much obliged to whoever translated it for me." And Meg's downcast face brightened as she spoke.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)