Thursday, April 24, 2025

word weird: dream


dream

* related to the old norse draumr and the danish drøm - “merriment; noise”

* came from proto-germanic draugmas - “deception, illusion, phantasm”

* possible cognates: sanskrit druh - “seek to harm or injure”

* old english dream meant “joy, mirth, noisy merriment”, and also “music”

    * this version is different from the modern word for “sleeping vision”

    * it faded from use after early middle english

* before it meant “sleeping vision”, the old english dream (or swefn) meant “sleep”


(from “origin and history of dream”, etymonline.)


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