obscure

English

Etymology

From Middle English obscure, from Old French obscur, from Latin obscūrus (“dark, dusky, indistinct”), from ob- +‎ *scūrus, from Proto-Italic *skoiros, from Proto-Indo-European *(s)ḱeh₃-. Doublet of oscuro.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /əbˈskjʊə(ɹ)/, /əbˈskjɔː(ɹ)/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /əbˈskjʊɹ/, /əbˈskjɝ/

  • Audio (US):

    (file)

• Rhymes: -ʊə(ɹ), -ɔː(ɹ), -ɜː(ɹ)
• Hyphenation: ob‧scure

Adjective

obscure (comparative obscurer or more obscure, superlative obscurest or most obscure)

1. Dark, faint or indistinct.
   • 1892, Denton Jaques Snider, Inferno, 1, 1-2 (originally by Dante Alighieri)

     I found myself in an obscure wood.

   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Proverbs 20:20:

     His lamp shall be put out in obscure darkness.

2. Hidden, out of sight or inconspicuous.
   • c. 1606 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Macbeth”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iii]:

     The obscure bird / Clamoured the livelong night.

   • 1606, John Davies of Hereford, Bien Venu:

     the obscure corners of the earth

3. Difficult to understand.
   • 1953, Samuel Beckett, Watt, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Grove Press, published 1959, →OCLC:

     The lock was of a kind that Watt could not pick. Watt could pick simple locks, but he could not pick obscure locks.

   • 2013 August 3, “The machine of a new soul”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8847:

     The yawning gap in neuroscientists’ understanding of their topic is in the intermediate scale of the brain’s anatomy. Science has a passable knowledge of how individual nerve cells, known as neurons, work. It also knows which visible lobes and ganglia of the brain do what. But how the neurons are organised in these lobes and ganglia remains obscure.

   an obscure passage or inscription;    The speaker made obscure references to little-known literary works.

4. Not well-known.
   • 2024 August 4, @rainbowresort_, Twitter‎^[1], archived from the original on 5 August 2024:

     i need to be REALLY careful to not use any obscure words. otherwise my tweets might end up on a wiktionary page

5. Unknown or uncertain; unclear.

   The etymological roots of the word "blizzard" are obscure and open to debate.

Usage notes

• The comparative obscurer and superlative obscurest, though formed by valid rules for English, are less common than more obscure and most obscure.

Synonyms

• (dark): cimmerian, dingy; See also Thesaurus:dark
• (faint or indistinct): fuzzy, ill-defined; See also Thesaurus:indistinct
• (hidden, out of sight): occluded, secluded; See also Thesaurus:hidden
• (difficult to understand): fathomless, inscrutable; See also Thesaurus:incomprehensible
• (not well-known): enigmatic, esoteric, mysterious; See also Thesaurus:arcane

Antonyms

• clear

Derived terms

• obscurable
• obscure honeyeater
• unobscurable
• obscureness

Related terms

• clare-obscure
• clear-obscure
• obscuration
• obscurity

 

Translations

dark, faint or indistinct

• Arabic: مُظْلِم (muẓlim)
• Armenian: please add this translation if you can
• Bulgarian: тъмен (bg) (tǎmen), мрачен (bg) (mračen)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 不清楚 (zh) (bù qīngchu), 陰暗／阴暗 (zh) (yīn'àn), 模糊 (zh) (móhu)

• Czech: (dark) temný (cs) m, (indistinct) nezřetelný m
• Dutch: duister (nl)
• Esperanto: obskura
• Finnish: hämärä (fi)
• French: obscur (fr)
• Georgian: ბუნდოვანი (bundovani)
• German: obskur (de), dunkel (de), vernebelt (de), finster (de), düster (de), undeutlich (de), unklar (de), unbestimmt (de), zweifelhaft (de), dahergelaufen
• Hungarian: sötét (hu), homályos (hu), bizonytalan (hu)
• Italian: oscuro (it)
• Japanese: 朦朧とした (ja) (もうろうとした, mōrō to shita), 不明瞭 (ja) (ふめいりょう, fumeiryō)
• Khmer: ស្រអាប់ (km) (srɑ’ap), លឹម (lɨm), ព្រឹលៗ (prɨl-prɨl)
• Korean: 애매한 (aemaehan)
• Macedonian: нејасен m (nejasen), мрачен m (mračen), замаглен m (zamaglen)
• Maori: rehurehu, tāpōuri
• Old Norse: myrkr
• Polish: ciemny (pl) m, niewyraźny (pl) m
• Portuguese: obscuro (pt)
• Romanian: obscur (ro), întunecos (ro)
• Russian: тёмный (ru) (tjómnyj), нея́сный (ru) (nejásnyj), сму́тный (ru) (smútnyj)
• Scots: mirk
• Spanish: obscuro (es)
• Suku: obscure
• Swedish: mörk (sv)
• Thai: please add this translation if you can
• Vietnamese: mờ mịt (vi), tối tăm (vi)

hidden, out of sight or inconspicuous

• Bulgarian: скрит (bg) (skrit), неясен (bg) (nejasen)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 不顯眼的／不显眼的 (zh) (bù xiǎnyǎn de), 不引人注意的 (zh) (bù yǐn rén zhùyì de)

• Dutch: verborgen (nl)
• Finnish: huomaamaton (fi), piiloutunut (fi)
• German: unbedeutend (de), versteckt (de), verborgen (de), unsichtbar (de), schleierhaft (de), unbekannt (de)
• Hungarian: rejtett (hu)
• Italian: nascosto (it) m, oscurato (it) m
• Polish: ukryty (pl) m, mało znany m
• Romanian: obscur (ro), retras (ro), ascuns (ro)
• Russian: скры́тый (ru) (skrýtyj)
• Scots: mirk

difficult to understand

• Bulgarian: неразбираем (bg) (nerazbiraem)
• Finnish: hämärä (fi), vaikeaselkoinen (fi)
• French: sibyllin (fr)
• German: unverständlich (de)
• Greek:

  Ancient: ἀσαφής (asaphḗs)

• Hungarian: homályos (hu), zavaros (hu), érthetetlen (hu), kusza (hu)
• Italian: confuso (it) m, poco chiaro m, vago (it) m, indistinto (it) m
• Latin: ambiguus
• Russian: непоня́тный (ru) m (neponjátnyj), нея́сный (ru) m (nejásnyj)
• Spanish: obscuro (es), conceptuoso (es) (pejorative)
• Vietnamese: tối nghĩa (vi)
• Welsh: astrus (cy)

not well-known

• Bulgarian: неизвестен (bg) (neizvesten)
• Finnish: obskuuri (fi)
• Hungarian: ismeretlen (hu), jelentéktelen (hu), obskúrus (hu)
• Russian: малоизве́стный (ru) (maloizvéstnyj)
• Spanish: obscuro (es), conceptuoso (es) (pejorative)
• Vietnamese: ít người biết đến

Verb

obscure (third-person singular simple present obscures, present participle obscuring, simple past and past participle obscured)

1. (transitive) To render obscure; to darken; to make dim; to keep in the dark; to hide; to make less visible, intelligible, legible, glorious, beautiful, or illustrious.
   • c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merry Wiues of Windsor”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene iii]:

     They are all couched in a pit hard by Herne's oak, with obscured lights.

   • c. 1688', William Wake, Preparation for Death

     There is scarce any duty which has been so obscured in the writings of learned men as this.

2. (transitive) To hide, put out of sight etc.
   • 1959, Georgette Heyer, chapter 1, in The Unknown Ajax:

     But Richmond […] appeared to lose himself in his own reflections. Some pickled crab, which he had not touched, had been removed with a damson pie; and his sister saw, peeping around the massive silver epergne that almost obscured him from her view, that he had eaten no more than a spoonful of that either.

   • 1961 December, “Planning the London Midland main-line electrification”, in Trains Illustrated, page 719:

     However, many people—including railwaymen—are only beginning to realise how great is the amount of civil engineering work necessary to achieve adequate clearances for high-voltage overhead equipment under bridges and tunnels; what is involved in the re-signalling needed to permit the increased throughput of traffic (in some places it is unavoidable, to afford better sighting of signals obscured by overhead electrical gear); [...].

   • 1994, Bill Watterson, Homicidal Psycho Jungle Cat, page 62:

     I realized that the purpose of writing is to inflate weak ideas, obscure poor reasoning, and inhibit clarity.

3. (intransitive, obsolete) To conceal oneself; to hide.
   • 1623 (first performance), John Fletcher, William Rowley, “The Maid in the Mill”, in Comedies and Tragedies […], London: […] Humphrey Robinson, […], and for Humphrey Moseley […], published 1647, →OCLC, Act IV, scene ii:

     How! There's bad news. / I must obscure, and hear it.

Synonyms

• (to render obscure; to darken; dim): becloud, bedarken, bedim, bemist

Translations

to darken, make faint

• Bulgarian: затъмнявам (bg) (zatǎmnjavam), помрачавам (bg) (pomračavam)
• Finnish: hämärtää (fi)
• French: obscurcir (fr)
• German: verdunkeln (de), vernebeln (de), verunklaren, verwirren (de)
• Italian: oscurare (it), offuscare (it)
• Maori: whakarehurehu
• Polish: zaciemnić (pl), przesłonić
• Romanian: obscura (ro), întuneca (ro)
• Russian: затемня́ть (ru) (zatemnjátʹ)
• Spanish: obscurecer (es)

to hide, put out of sight

• Finnish: piilottaa (fi)
• French: obscurcir (fr)
• German: verschleiern (de), verdecken (de), verbergen (de)
• Italian: nascondere (it), occultare (it)
• Latin: caecō
• Polish: ukryć (pl), schować (pl)
• Romanian: ascunde (ro), oculta
• Russian: скрыва́ть (ru) (skryvátʹ), пря́тать (ru) (prjátatʹ)
• Spanish: esconder (es), ocultar (es), obscurecer (es), asconder (es), absconder (es)

Further reading

• “obscure”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “obscure”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.

Anagrams

• Cuberos

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɔp.skyʁ/

• Audio:

  (file)

Adjective

obscure

1. feminine singular of obscur

Anagrams

• courbes

Latin

Adjective

obscūre

1. vocative masculine singular of obscūrus

References

• “obscure”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “obscure”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• obscure in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.