simoom
Britishnoun
Etymology
Origin of simoom
from Arabic samūm poisonous, from sam poison, from Aramaic sammā poison
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
If you happen to be in Africa and stuck in a “hot, dry, suffocating sand-wind” which sweeps across the deserts at intervals during the spring, you should know that you are in a simoom.
From Time • Mar. 20, 2014
The monsoon and simoom, In the soft empurpled Orient, At mention of thy name Doff all the hats of Heathendom!
From Cobwebs from a Library Corner by Bangs, John Kendrick
I should think they must resemble the African simoom.
From A Boy's Voyage Round the World by Smiles, Samuel
The phenomenon that had broken over the arenaceous couch, upon which slept the four castaways, was neither more nor less than a “sandstorm”; or, to give it its Arab title, a simoom.
From The Boy Slaves by Reid, Mayne
Zarah was the one flower left in the desert over which the simoom had swept; her smile was to the bereaved mother as the bright smile of hope.
From Hebrew Heroes A Tale Founded on Jewish History by A. L. O. E.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
