A.Word.A.Day --somnolence

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somnolence

PRONUNCIATION:

(SOM-nuh-luhns)

MEANING:

noun: A state of sleepiness or drowsiness.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Latin somnus (sleep). Ultimately from the Indo-European root swep- (to sleep), which is also the source of insomnia, hypnosis, soporific (inducing sleep), soporose (sleepy), somnambulate (to walk in sleep), and Sanskrit svapnah (dream). Earliest documented use: around 1386.

NOTES:

Somnopathy, a variant of somnipathy, the word for a sleep disorder, has four consecutive letters from the alphabet.

USAGE:

"The electorate entered a new phase of alertness following a sustained period of disengagement from politics, bordering on somnolence."
Hugh Mackay; Voters Sense a Howard Weakness; The Age (Melbourne, Australia); Mar 10, 2007.

See more usage examples of somnolence in Vocabulary.com's dictionary.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

Loyalty to a petrified opinion never yet broke a chain or freed a human soul. -Mark Twain, author and humorist (1835-1910)

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