drowse
Americanverb (used without object)
-
to be sleepy or half-asleep.
-
to be dull or sluggish.
verb (used with object)
-
to pass or spend (time) in drowsing (often followed byaway ).
He drowsed away the morning.
-
to make sleepy.
noun
verb
noun
Etymology
Origin of drowse
before 900; Old English drūsian to droop, become sluggish (not recorded in ME); akin to Old English drēosan to fall
Explanation
To doze lightly, or nearly fall asleep, is to drowse. If you stay up too late watching scary movies, you might start to drowse the next morning in English class. You've probably found yourself beginning to drowse when you're very sleepy or bored. You'll know you're starting to drowse when your eyelids get heavy and your mind wanders. Be careful though—if you drowse too long at the beach, you may end up with a sunburn! Drowse comes from the adjective drowsy, from an Old English root meaning "sink."
Vocabulary lists containing drowse
Tolkien Reading Day, List 9
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Charlotte's Web
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Festival of Sleep Day
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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.
The town's park benches are crowded with bargain widowers -- husbands who drowse in the sunshine while their wives continue the hunt.
From Time Magazine Archive
The American cast keeps its English accents tidy but not its performances, and Director Alan Schneider lets the first act drowse.
From Time Magazine Archive
Once ashore, the voyagers were soon far too busy to lose themselves in the drowse of flowers.
From Time Magazine Archive
In Kearny, N.J., police were inclined to believe Station Attendant Louis Washington's story that he had slept through two burglaries of Red's Trucking Terminal when he fell into a drowse during questioning at police headquarters.
From Time Magazine Archive
“Twitching noase be one neame,” answered the hedgehog obstinately, “and a-twitching of that noase be another, me- aster. Now you move along, kind Measter Brock, and leave a poor crofter to teak ’is winter drowse.
From "The Once and Future King" by T. H. White
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.
