crest-fallen, ppl. a.
(ˈkrɛstˌfɔːlən)
1. With drooping crest; hence, cast down in confidence, spirits, or courage; humbled, abashed, disheartened, dispirited, dejected.
| 1589 Pappe w. Hatchet D iv b, O how meager and leane hee lookt, so creast falne, that his combe hung downe to his bill. 1593 Shakes. 2 Hen. VI, iv. i. 59 Let it make thee Crest⁓falne, I, and alay this thy abortiue Pride. 1668 Marvell Corr. cv. Wks. 1872–5 II. 264 He is here a kind of decrepit young gentleman and terribly crest-falln. 1860 Thackeray Four Georges iii. (1876) 69 Slinking back into the club somewhat crestfallen after his beating. |
2. Of a horse: see quot. 1725.
| 1696 Lond. Gaz. No. 3217/4 A grey Gelding..black mane and tail, and a little Crest-fallen. 1725 Bradley Fam. Dict., Crestfallen, a Distemper in Horses, when the Part on which the Main grows, which is the upper Part thereof, and call'd the Crest, hangs either to one Side or the other, and does not stand upright as it ought to do. |
Hence ˈcrestˌfallenly adv., ˈcrestˌfallenness.
| 1854 Lytton What will he iv. i, That ineffable aspect of crestfallenness! 1880 R. Broughton Sec. Th. I. i. ii. 28 The Squire is crestfallenly eying the shipwreck of his hopes. 1890 ― Alas! II. xxiv. 125 A look of mortification and crestfallenness. |