Etymologically
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troublesome

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Pronunciation

  • /ˈtɹʌbəlsəm/, /ˈtɹʌbl̩səm/[1]

Etymology

It is formed from English trouble + -some,[2][3][4][5] from the noun.[2][3] Trouble came into Middle English about 1200 from Old French truble (“trouble, disturbance”), from trubler (“to disturb, make cloudy”), a metathesis of torbler, from Vulgar Latin *turbulō, from Late Latin turbidō (“to make turbid”), from Latin turbidus (“turbid”).[3] Compare troubled and troublous.[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Full of disturbance; disorderly, unsettled: 1548, in Hall's chronicle The Union, a sense obsolete after 1687.[2] Etymonline and Dictionary.com date the word to the 1540s,[3][5] and MWU gives 1542 as its first known use, for the sense "requiring sustained effort".[6]

Semantic evolution

The first senses described a state of disorder: turbulent (1552–1687), stormy (1560–1623), and full of affliction or distress (1552), which survives as an archaic sense.[2] The main modern sense, causing trouble, annoyance or worry, appears in 1573 in Gabriel Harvey's letter-book,[2] or in the 1570s according to Etymonline,[3] and the sense "laborious, wearisome" from 1576, now rare.[2] Johnson (1755) defined it as "full of molestation; vexatious; uneasy; afflictive" and as "burdensome; tiresome; wearisome", quoting Shakespeare's How troublesome it sat upon my head.[7]

Timeline

  • 1542 – requiring sustained effort, laborious.[6]
  • 1548 – full of disturbance, disorderly (obsolete after 1687).[2]
  • 1552 – turbulent; troubled, distressed.[2]
  • 1560 – stormy (obsolete after 1623).[2]
  • 1573 – causing trouble, annoyance or worry.[2]
  • 1576 – laborious, wearisome.[2]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. Causing trouble, annoyance or worry; difficult to deal with: a troublesome cough that kept him awake.[8][6][2][4]
  2. Needing a great deal of effort or attention; laborious.[6][2][7]
  3. (archaic) Marked by disturbance or violence; turbulent.[8][6][2]
  4. (archaic) Troubled or afflicted; distressed.[6][2]

Word family

  • troublesomely
  • troublesomeness

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  6. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  7. ^ a b 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 Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins