somniferous

American  

[som-nif-er-uhs, suhm-] / sɒmˈnɪf ər əs, səm- /

adjective

1. bringing or inducing sleep, as drugs or influences.

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somniferous British  

/ sɒmˈnɪfərəs /

adjective

1. rare tending to induce sleep

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Other Word Forms

• somniferously
  adverb

Etymology

Origin of somniferous

1595–1605; < Latin somnifer inducing sleep ( somni-, combining form of somnus sleep + -fer -fer ) + -ous

Explanation

Whether it's a medication or a boring lecture, something somniferous makes you sleepy. Like soporific, somniferous is a word used to describe something that puts you to sleep. Some people who have trouble snoozing take pills that are somniferous: sleeping pills. Others do somniferous things, like reading before bed or counting sheep. A bad public speaker can be really somniferous, and so can a boring movie. Anything somniferous makes you want to catch some Z's.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

somniferous

Everyone was back in the Dolby Theatre, a welcome return after last year’s somniferous experiment from Steven Soderbergh, which was held in Los Angeles’s Union Station.

From Washington Post ● Mar. 28, 2022

Still, it’s a somniferous situation for the photographers, who camp out in their cars for hours at a time for a few seconds of activity.

From New York Times ● Jun. 1, 2019

Her study of library-cataloguing, recording, books of reference, was easy and not too somniferous.

From Main Street by Sinclair Lewis

This somniferous influence, which is to some extent exercised by local electrization, is here distinguished by its far greater constancy as well as by its greater degree of perfection.

From The Electric Bath by George M. Schweig

Night otherwise fallen dark and somniferous to modern mankind.

From History of Friedrich II of Prussia — Volume 11 by Thomas Carlyle