different between trepidation vs qualm

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin trepid?ti?, from trepid? (“be agitated”)

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation, US) IPA^(key): /?t??p.??de?.??n/

Noun

trepidation (countable and uncountable, plural trepidations)

1. A fearful state; a state of concern or hesitation.

   Synonyms: agitation, apprehension, consternation, fear, hesitation, worry

   • 1929, M. Barnard Eldershaw, A House Is Built, Chapter VII, Section vi

     She opened the drawing-room door in trepidation. Would she find Esther drowned with her head in the goldfish bowl, or hanged from the chandelier by her stay-lace?
2. An involuntary trembling, sometimes an effect of paralysis, but usually caused by terror or fear; quaking; quivering.
3. (astronomy, obsolete) A libration of the starry sphere in the Ptolemaic system; a motion ascribed to the firmament, to account for certain small changes in the position of the ecliptic and of the stars.

Related terms

Translations

References

• Douglas Harper (2001–2021) , “trepidation”, in Online Etymology Dictionary

Anagrams

• departition, partitioned

English

Alternative forms

• calm (dialectal)

Etymology

Perhaps from Middle English qualm, cwalm (“death, sickness, plague”), which is from Old English cwealm (West Saxon: "death, disaster, plague"), ?tcualm (Anglian: "utter destruction"), from Proto-West Germanic *kwalm (“killing, death, destruction”), from Proto-Indo-European *g?elH- (“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 stream, well up”). The sense "feeling of faintness" is from 1530; "uneasiness, doubt" from 1553; "scruple of conscience" from 1649.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /kw?m/, /kw?m/, /kw?lm/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /kw??m/, /kw??m/

Noun

qualm (plural qualms)

1. A feeling of apprehension, doubt, fear etc. [from 16th c.]
2. A sudden sickly feeling; queasiness. [from 16th c.]
3. A prick of the conscience; a moral scruple, a pang of guilt. (Now often in negative constructions.) [from 17th c.]

4. (archaic, Britain dialectal) Mortality; plague; pestilence.
5. (archaic, Britain dialectal) A calamity or disaster.

Synonyms

• compunction
• misgiving
• scruple
• unease/uneasiness
• See Thesaurus:apprehension

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

Verb

qualm (third-person singular simple present qualms, present participle qualming, simple past and past participle qualmed)

1. (intransitive) To have a sickly feeling.

References

• Douglas Harper (2001–2021) , “qualm”, in Online Etymology Dictionary

Middle English

Alternative forms

• cwalm, cualm, qwalm, qualme

Etymology

From Old English cwealm, from Proto-West Germanic *kwalm.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /kwalm/

Noun

qualm

1. Plague, disease or sickness; that which afflicts.
2. The effects, fruits, or ravages of plague.
3. (rare) Killing (as a concept or as an instance)

Descendants

• English: qualm (possibly)
• Scots: qualm (possibly)

References

• “qualm, n.(1).”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-11-12.