qualm

CEFRC1

/kwɑːm/

noun

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    noun

    A feeling of doubt or worry about doing something.

  2. 02

    noun

    Extra detail

    A prick of the conscience; a moral scruple, a pang of guilt.

Examples

  • He did not have any qualm of conscience.

  • My main qualm about the English language is its unmathematical and awkward orthography.

At a glance

Sits at C1 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
1
Citations
5
Synonyms
5

Also pronounced

  • /kwɑ(l)m/

Deep Dive

noun

Extra meanings

  1. A sudden sickly feeling; queasiness.

  2. A feeling of apprehension, doubt, fear etc.

  3. Mortality; plague; pestilence.

More examples

In context

  • This lawyer has no qualms about saving people who are on the wrong side of the law.

  • "Do you have any particular qualms about leaving Pencey?" / "Oh, I have a few qualms, all right. Sure … but not too many. Not yet, anyway.[…]"

  • [W]ho vvould not rather Sleep Quietly upon a Hammock, vvithout either Cares in his Head, or Crudities in his Stomach, then lye Carking upon a Bed of State, vvith the Qualms and Tvvinges that accompany Surfeits and Exceſs?

Synonyms

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

He felt a blank about the plan to cheat, which made him confess instantly.

Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

Nearby

Origin

noun

Perhaps from Middle English qualm, cwalm (“death, sickness, plague”), which is from Old English cwealm (West Saxon: "death, disaster, plague"), ūtcualm (Anglian: "utter destruction"), from Proto-West Germanic *kwalm (“killing, death, destruction”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʷelH- (“to stick, pierce; pain, injury, death”), whence also quell. Although the sense development is possible, this has the problem that there are no attestations in intermediate senses before the appearance of "pang of apprehension, etc." in the 16th century. The alternative etymology is from Dutch kwalm or German Qualm (“steam, vapor, mist”) earlier “daze, stupefaction”, which is from the root of German quellen (“to...