For forms see the vb. [f. LOUR v.]
1. A gloomy or sullen look; a frown, scowl.
13[?]. Seuyn Sag. (W.), 1952. Whi makest thou swich scher and foul lour?
1530. Palsgr., 241/1. Loure an yvell loke.
1578. T. Procter, Gorg. Gallery, L iij. What are your sweet smiles, quite turnd into lowres?
1598. Drayton, Heroic. Ep., Wks. (1748), 83. In one smile or lowre of thy sweet eye Consists my life.
1704. Steele, Lying Lover, I. i. 2. Han’t I a down bookish Lour? a wise Sadness.
1814. Scott, Wav., xviii. A sudden, though transient lour of the eye, shewed a hasty, haughty, and vindictive temper.
2. Of the sky, weather, etc.: Gloominess, threatening appearance; an instance of this.
1596. B. Griffin, Fidessa (1876), 35. I am no leauing of alwithering age, I haue not suffred many winter lowres.
1686. Goad, Celest. Bodies, II. iv. 214. [It] is apt to Heat, and sometimes … to Dryth; but more frequently to Lowr, Bluster, Rain.
1808. Scott, Marm., V. Introd. For thy dark cloud, with umber’d lower, That hung o’er cliff, and lake, and tower.
1816. J. Wilson, City of Plague, II. ii. 209. Alike unto that fearless flower … The sunlight’s smile—the tempest’s lower.
