lonesome

Etymology

It is formed from English lone + -some,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} with the suffix that forms adjectives meaning "tending to, causing".^[3] An older adjective of the same meaning was loneful, from the 1560s.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Solitary, lonely, of a person, and unfrequented, desolate, of a place: both in 1647, in Henry More's Philosophicall Poems.^[2][5] Etymonline dates the word to the 1640s.^[3]

Semantic evolution

Both senses later took on an emotional colouring: of a person, feeling forlorn for lack of company, and of a place, making one feel lonely.^[2][4] Johnson (1755) defined it as "solitary; dismal".^[7] Lonesome for, missing someone, is recorded from 1905.^[2] The noun use in by one's lonesome or on one's lonesome, alone, appeared in the late 19th century:^[2][4] DARE quotes all by my lonesome from Kansas in 1897,^[8] and the New Partridge records on your lonesome in Australia from 1902.^[9] DARE also records lonesome as a noun for loneliness, from southeastern Kentucky (1942).^[8]

Timeline

• 1647 – solitary, lonely; of a place, unfrequented.^[2][5]
• 1897 – by one's lonesome, alone, recorded in Kansas.^[8] The OED's first quotation is from 1899.^[2][5]
• 1902 – on your lonesome, in Australia.^[9]
• 1905 – lonesome for, missing someone.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Sad because of being alone or apart from others; lonely; also lonesome for, missing someone: She got lonesome for her brother after he moved away.^[5][10][2]
2. Causing a feeling of loneliness: a lonesome winter evening.^[5][2]
3. Of a place, remote and little visited; desolate.^[5][2][4]

Noun

1. by one's lonesome, on one's lonesome: (informal) alone, on one's own.^[10][5][4]

Word family

• lonesomely
• lonesomeness

Related words

• lone
• alone
• lonely
• loneliness

Usage notes

Collins describes the adjective as chiefly American and Canadian, another word for lonely, and gives the phrase as on one's lonesome, in the United States by one's lonesome.^[10] Etymonline quotes the Century Dictionary's distinction: loneliness expresses the uncomfortable longing for company of someone alone, while lonesomeness may be a lighter, more physical feeling of being alone, and more often expresses the impression made on an observer.^[3]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
7. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
8. ^ a b c Cassidy, Frederic G. & Joan Houston Hall (eds.) (1985–2002), Dictionary of American Regional English, vols I–IV, Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
9. ^ a b Dalzell, Tom; Victor, Terry, eds. (2013), The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English, 2nd ed., London: Routledge
10. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins