different between glum vs touchy

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?l?m/
• Rhymes: -?m

Etymology 1

Probably from Middle Low German glum (“glum”), related to German dialectal glumm (“gloomy, troubled, turbid”). More at gloomy.

Adjective

glum (comparative glummer, superlative glummest)

1. despondent; moody; sullen
   • 1857-1859, William Makepeace Thackeray, The Virginians

     I […] frighten people by my glum face.

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English glomen, glommen, glomben, gloumben (“to frown, look sullen”), from *glom (“gloom”). More at gloom.

Verb

glum (third-person singular simple present glums, present participle glumming, simple past and past participle glummed)

1. (obsolete) To look sullen; to be of a sour countenance; to be glum.
   • 1509, Stephen Hawes, The Passetyme of Pleasure

     upon me he gan to loure and glum,
     Enforcing him so for to ryse withall,
     But that I shortly unto hem did cum,
     With his thre hedes he spytte all his venum

Noun

glum (uncountable)

1. (obsolete) sullenness
   • c. 1550, John Skelton, Colyn Cloute

     That they be deaf and dumb,
     And play silence and glum

English

Etymology

From a later variant of tachy, techy, teachie, tetchy, simulating touch +? -y. More at tetchy.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?t?t?i/

• Rhymes: -?t?i

Adjective

touchy (comparative touchier, superlative touchiest)

1. (of a situation) Extremely sensitive or volatile; easily disturbed to the point of becoming unstable; requiring caution or tactfulness.

   It is an extremely touchy situation, with everybody's patience wearing thin.

2. (of a person) Easily offended; oversensitive; ticklish.

   He can be very touchy when you talk about his cat, so be as tactful as possible.

Related terms

• touchy-feely

Translations

See also

• tetchy
• touch and go

Anagrams

• couthy