sloom

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /sluːm/
• Rhymes: -uːm

Etymology 1

From Middle English *sloume, sloumbe, slume, from Old English slūma (“sleep, slumber”), from Proto-Germanic *slūm- (“to be slack, loose, or limp”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)lew- (“limp, flabby”). Compare slumber and Dutch sloom.

Alternative forms

• sloum

Noun

sloom (plural slooms)

1. A gentle sleep; slumber.

Derived terms

• sloomy

Etymology 2

From (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Middle English slumen, slummen, from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Old English *slūmian (“to slumber, sleep gently”), from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Proto-Germanic *slūm- (“to be slack, loose, or limp”), from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Proto-Indo-European *(s)lew- (“limp, flabby”).

Alternative forms

• sloum, sleam

Verb

sloom (third-person singular simple present slooms, present participle slooming, simple past and past participle sloomed)

1. (Scotland, obsolete) To sleep lightly, to doze, to nod; to be half-asleep.
   • 1886, Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr, The Squire of Sandal-Side A Pastoral Romance:

     The squire sloomed and slept in his chair; and finally, after a cup of tea, went to bed.

   • a. 1853 Jane Ermina Locke, "Elia", in The Recalled: In Voices of the Past, and Poems of the Ideal, James Munroe and Company (1854), page 193:

     To his castle’s portal, / At the morning gloaming, / Bore they all the mortal / From the battle’s foaming, / Of the white bannered warrior knight, / Cold in his armor slooming!

   • 1900, Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr, The Maid of Maiden lane, Dodd, Mead and Company, page 181:

     Then the doctor was slooming and nodding, and waking up and saying a word or two, and relapsing again into semi-unconsciousness.

   • 1936, Esmond Quinterley, Ushering Interlude,^[1] The Fortune Press, page 66:

     The afternoon sun painted amber patterns on the Turkey red hearthrug: the only splash of colour in the dun room. Potter sloomed in the arms of the chair.

   • 2001, Gemma O'Connor, Walking on Water,^[2][3] Berkley Publishing Group (2003), →ISBN, page 205:

     He lay slooming half-asleep, half-awake, thinking about Tuesday afternoon.

2. (of plants or soil) To soften or rot with damp.
   • a. 1807 unidentified young farmer, letter to his father, printed in Edinburgh Farmers’ Magazine 1807, reprinted in The Farmer’s Register, Volume 7, Number 9 (1839 September 30), page 540:

     He adds, that one hundred bolls, or fifty quarters of wheat may be thrashed in a day of eight hours, unless the grain has been sloomed or mildewed; […]

   • 1824 August, “Remarks on Captian Napier's Essay on Store-Farming”, in The Farmer’s Magazine, Volume XXV, Archibald Constable and Company (publishers), page 329:

     […] no other spot over their whole pastured offered as much verdure at this time as these seemingly sloomed places.

   • c. 1854 Alexander J. Main, “Experiments with Special Manures”, in Transactions of the Highland and Agricultural Society of Scotland, W. Blackwood & Sons (1855), page 17:

     It must be explained, however, that in the latter case the “slooming” of the crop had an injurious effect on its yield; […]

References

• Jamieson's Dictionary of the Scottish language (1867) [4]
• “sloom”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• Dictionary of the Scots Language, “sloom”

Anagrams

• looms, mools, osmol, slo mo, slo-mo, slomo

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Dutch

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /sloːm/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -oːm

Adjective

sloom (comparative slomer, superlative sloomst)

1. sluggish, lifeless

Inflection

Declension of sloom
uninflected	sloom
inflected	slome
comparative	slomer
		positive	comparative	superlative
predicative/adverbial		sloom	slomer	het sloomst het sloomste
indefinite	m./f. sing.	slome	slomere	sloomste
	n. sing.	sloom	slomer	sloomste
	plural	slome	slomere	sloomste
definite		slome	slomere	sloomste
partitive		slooms	slomers	—