slumber
noun
- naturally recurring resting state of mind and body
- a sleep of short duration
verb
- to get into a naturally recurring state of mind and body
- to have a sleep of short duration
- sleep
Wiktionary
Pronunciation: /ˈslʌm.bə/ / /ˈslʌm.bɚ/ / /ˈslʊm.bə/
noun
Etymology: From Middle English slombren, slomren, frequentative of Middle English slummen, slumen (“to doze”), probably from Middle English slume (“slumber”), from Old English slūma, from Proto-Germanic *slūm- (“slack, loose, limp, flabby”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)lew- (“loose, limp, flabby”). Cognate with West Frisian slommerje, slûmerje (“to slumber”), Dutch sluimeren (“to slumber”), German schlummern (“to slumber, doze”), Swedish slummer (“to slumber”). By surface analysis, sloom + -er.
- A very light state of sleep, almost awake.
“Fast asleep? It is no matter; / Enjoy the honey-heavy dew of slumber.”
“Ev’n Luſt and Envy ſleep, yet Love denies / Reſt to my Soul, and ſlumber to my Eyes.”
- A very light state of sleep, almost awake.
- A state of ignorance or inaction.
“Marcel Duchamp's urinal and readymades seemed in the beginning to be insider jokes or jokelike paradoxes meant to awaken people from their aesthetic slumbers.”
- The snooze button on an alarm clock.
verb
Etymology: From Middle English slombren, slomren, frequentative of Middle English slummen, slumen (“to doze”), probably from Middle English slume (“slumber”), from Old English slūma, from Proto-Germanic *slūm- (“slack, loose, limp, flabby”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)lew- (“loose, limp, flabby”). Cognate with West Frisian slommerje, slûmerje (“to slumber”), Dutch sluimeren (“to slumber”), German schlummern (“to slumber, doze”), Swedish slummer (“to slumber”). By surface analysis, sloom + -er.
- To be in a very light state of sleep, almost awake.
“He that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.”
“If Sleep and Death be truly one, And every spirit’s folded bloom Thro’ all its intervital gloom In some long trance should slumber on; […]”
- To be inactive or negligent.
- To lay to sleep.
“slumber his conscience”
- To stun; to stupefy.
“Then vp he tooke the slombred sencelesse corse.”