shadowy Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. adjective satellite filled with shade
    umbrageous; shady; shadowed.
    • the shady side of the street
    • the surface of the pond is dark and shadowed
    • we sat on rocks in a shadowy cove
    • cool umbrageous woodlands
  2. adjective satellite lacking clarity or distinctness
    dim; faint; vague; wispy.
    • a dim figure in the distance
    • only a faint recollection
    • shadowy figures in the gloom
    • saw a vague outline of a building through the fog
    • a few wispy memories of childhood
  3. adjective satellite lacking in substance
    wraithlike.
    • strange fancies of unreal and shadowy worlds"- W.A.Butler
    • dim shadowy forms
    • a wraithlike column of smoke

WordNet

Shad"ow*y adjective
Definitions
  1. Full of shade or shadows; causing shade or shadow. "Shadowy verdure." Fenton.
    This shadowy desert, unfrequented woods. Shak.
  2. Hence, dark; obscure; gloomy; dim. "The shadowy past." Longfellow.
  3. Not brightly luminous; faintly light.
    The moon . . . with more pleasing light, Shadowy sets off the face things. Milton.
  4. Faintly representative; hence, typical.
    From sshadowy types to truth, from flesh to spirit. Milton.
  5. Unsubstantial; unreal; as, shadowy honor.
    Milton has brought into his poems two actors of a shadowy and fictitious nature, in the persons of Sin and Death. Addison.

Webster 1913