benumb
Americanverb (used with object)
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benumbs,
present (3rd person singular)
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benumbed,
past participle, past
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benumbing
present participle
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to make numb; deprive of sensation.
benumbed by cold.
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to render inactive; deaden or stupefy.
verb
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to make numb or powerless; deaden physical feeling in, as by cold
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(usually passive) to make inactive; stupefy (the mind, senses, will, etc)
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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benumbsimple
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benumbssimple
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have benumbedperfect
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has benumbedperfect
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am benumbingprogressive
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are benumbingprogressive
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is benumbingprogressive
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have been benumbingperfect progressive
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has been benumbingperfect progressive
Past
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benumbedsimple
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had benumbedperfect
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was benumbingprogressive
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were benumbingprogressive
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had been benumbingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of benumb
1350–1400; back formation from Middle English benomen, past participle of benimen to take away, Old English beniman; cognate with Dutch benemen, German benehmen, Gothic biniman. See be-, nimble, numb
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.
See Examples For:
Invention is kept alive, and the mind is not suffered to fall into that drowsy stupidity, which, in a civilized society, seems to benumb the understanding of the people….
From Forbes ● Aug. 26, 2014
Did not the chill Of age, perhaps of death, benumb my limbs, My watchful feet, accustomed to the path, Had led me to the spot.
From Joan of Arc A Play in Five Acts by Jane Alice Sargant
All this Todros heard in a dim and vague way; but it was enough, to benumb his heart, full of petrified faith and pride.
From An Obscure Apostle A Dramatic Story by C. S. de Soissons
The intense cold, that soon began to benumb the senses of Sandie, seemed to have no deterrent effect on his efforts.
From Wild Adventures round the Pole The Cruise of the "Snowbird" Crew in the "Arrandoon" by Gordon Stables
"If only one did not have to think during the long periods of uncertainty and ignorance, and could somehow benumb the senses until the hours of darkness had passed!"
From Through these Eyes The courageous struggle to find meaning in a life stressed with cancer by Lauren Ann Isaacson
And a humble suggestion for the icy, northwesterly breeze that so often benumbs New York City.
From New York Times ● Dec. 23, 2013
After offering some Soviet advance brass a dinner at his canonry, complete with vintage port, he benumbs them with a conducted tour of his cathedral.
From Time Magazine Archive
From the arctics and antarctics which they explore, they bring a refrigeration that benumbs artistic sensibilities.
From Time Magazine Archive
What assaults the eye often benumbs the brain, but now all the networks are doing the same.
From Time Magazine Archive
It gradually benumbs the conscience, and leads on, step by step, to those blacker vices at which the youth would once have shuddered.
From The Young Man's Guide by William A. (William Andrus) Alcott
Steinem spoke explicitly about pushing the women’s movement beyond its initial concerns—essentially, the benumbed, unfulfilled flourishing of white middle-class housewives like her own mother.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 3, 2026
Its importance may have been underestimated by a benumbed Supreme Court press, understandably focused on what is likely to be the Court’s decision.
From Slate ● Dec. 19, 2022
As friends and neighbors watch in silent awe, confused, benumbed, the father lowers the launcher and stage-growls the absolutely unnecessary: “It’s a boy.”
From Washington Post ● May 13, 2021
“A movie’s an hour and a half” is Amy’s benumbed reply — and that’s time she doesn’t have to waste.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 6, 2020
As, with benumbed legs, he slowly left the still sleeping town at daybreak, a crouching shadow emerged from the last hut and joined the pilgrim.
From "Siddhartha" by Hermann Hesse
I attended and can assure you that, contrary to the glamorously edited videos in the show, they were malfunctioning, formless, benumbing ordeals.
From The New Yorker ● May 22, 2017
Tate Modern's current show Exposed, on surveillance photography, feels intellectually threadbare and aesthetically benumbing.
From The Guardian ● Jul. 9, 2010
Instead of that benumbing, step-by-step chronology to which so many earnest biographers undiscriminatingly consign everything from laundry bills to emotional crises, Edel weaves back and forth in time and subject like a novelist.
From Time Magazine Archive
If Susan Sontag's prose style is laborious, her film making is absolutely benumbing.
From Time Magazine Archive
The Clinic had prepared me for it, benumbing my sense of shame, and besides, I was desperate for money.
From "Middlesex: A Novel" by Jeffrey Eugenides
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.
