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
As the storm-wind blows bleakly from the norland, As the snow-wind beats blindly on the moorland, As the simoom drives hot across the desert, As the thunder roars deep in the Unmeasured.
From The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Vol. I by Browning, Elizabeth Barrett
The phenomenon that had broken over the arenaceous couch,—upon which slept the four castaways,—was neither more nor less than a "sand-storm;" or, to give it its Arab title, a simoom.
From The Boy Slaves by Reid, Mayne
Waddles is a human simoom, carrying dust, sand and cactus.
From Fore! by Loan, Charles Emmett Van
We are told that on the 17th of June, 1859, there was much more of a genuine simoom.
From Life at Puget Sound: With Sketches of Travel in Washington Territory, British Columbia, Oregon and California by Leighton, Caroline C.
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.
