Misgiven

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. Filled with doubt, unease, or a sense that something will turn out badly, as in having had a troubling feeling about a plan
2. Having been left with a feeling of foreboding or distrust about how events were going to unfold
3. Affected by uneasy suspicion or dread about an outcome, a state once described as having a foreboding heart

Etymology: "Misgiven" is the past participle of "misgive", which is formed from the prefix "mis-" (wrongly, badly) and "give". The older sense of "give" that lies behind it is "suggest" or "put into the mind," so to misgive was originally to fill someone's mind with a bad suggestion, and only later did it come to mean feeling doubt or apprehension. That shift from a transfer of thought to a feeling of unease is the heart of the word's history. The form "misgiven" is the past participle, the form used with "have" or "be" in phrases such as "my mind was misgiven." Its origin is the same as its base verb: "mis-" joined to the Middle English "give," meaning "suggest, give."

Synonyms: doubt, dread, fear

Antonyms: trust, believe