dream

dream [dreem] ExamplesWord Origin noun

1. a succession of images, thoughts, or emotions passing through the mind during sleep.
2. the sleeping state in which this occurs.
3. an object seen in a dream.
4. an involuntary vision occurring to a person when awake.
5. a vision voluntarily indulged in while awake; daydream; reverie.
6. an aspiration; goal; aim: A trip to Europe is his dream.
7. a wild or vain fancy.
8. something of an unreal beauty, charm, or excellence.

verb (used without object), dreamed or dreamt, dream·ing.

9. to have a dream.
10. to indulge in daydreams or reveries: He dreamed about vacation plans when he should have been working.
11. to think or conceive of something in a very remote way (usually followed by of): I wouldn’t dream of asking them.

verb (used with object), dreamed or dreamt, dream·ing.

12. to see or imagine in sleep or in a vision.
13. to imagine as if in a dream; fancy; suppose.
14. to pass or spend (time) in dreaming (often followed by away): to dream away the afternoon.

adjective

15. most desirable; ideal: a dream vacation.

Verb Phrases

16. dream up, to form in the imagination; devise: They dreamed up the most impossible plan.

Origin of dream 1200–50; Middle English dreem, Old English drēam joy, mirth, gladness, cognate with Old Saxon drōm mirth, dream, Old Norse draumr, Old High German troum dream; modern sense first recorded in ME but presumably also current in Old English, as in Old Saxon Related formsdream·ful, adjectivedream·ful·ly, adverbdream·ful·ness, noundream·ing·ly, adverbdream·like, adjectivere·dream, verb, re·dreamed or re·dreamt, re·dream·ing.un·dreamed, adjectiveun·dream·ing, adjectiveun·dream·like, adjectiveSynonym study 1. Dream, nightmare, and vision refer to the kinds of mental images that form during sleep. Dream is the general term for any such succession of images. A nightmare is a dream that brings fear or anxiety: frightened by a nightmare. Vision refers to a series of images of unusual vividness, clarity, order, and significance, sometimes seen in a dream. Related Words for dreamed imagination, nightmare, delusion, idea, thought, fantasy, image, desire, wish, aspiration, ambition, notion, hope, visualize, daydream, conceive, invent, crave, fantasize, think Examples from the Web for dreamed Contemporary Examples of dreamed

Once upon a time, a girl named Onika Maraj dreamed of being an actress.

Nicki Minaj: High School Actress

Alex Chancey, The Daily Beast Video

December 30, 2014

Bin Laden killed the boy, not us, and I slept and I dreamed.

I Shot Bin Laden

Elliot Ackerman

November 16, 2014

Big Kahuna Burger is a fictional chain of Hawaiian-themed fast food burger joints out in Los Angeles dreamed up by Tarantino.

The Secrets of ‘Pulp Fiction’: 20 Things You Didn’t Know About the Movie on Its 20th Anniversary

Marlow Stern

October 19, 2014

He said he dreamed of starting a school after selling his computer business in Houston in 1989.

At This Creepy Libertarian Charter School, Kids Must Swear ‘to Be Obedient to Those in Authority’

ProPublica

October 15, 2014

When you have a wife who has been a tower of strength and shown more courage than you dreamed existed, that’s the finest I know.

The Stacks: The Day Lou Gehrig Delivered Baseball’s Gettysburg Address

Ray Robinson

July 4, 2014

Historical Examples of dreamed

We would never have dreamed of defying the registrar, would we, Emma?

Grace Harlowe’s Return to Overton Campus

Jessie Graham Flower

The leper himself would never have dreamed of his touching him.

Weighed and Wanting

George MacDonald

This was the recompense of which she had dreamed through soul-tearing ages.

Within the Law

Marvin Dana

The night assistant, who dreamed sometimes of fire, stood nervously by.

K

Mary Roberts Rinehart

For was not this the adventure of which she had so often dreamed?

The Dream

Emile Zola

British Dictionary definitions for dreamed dream noun

1. 1. mental activity, usually in the form of an imagined series of events, occurring during certain phases of sleep
   2. (as modifier)a dream sequence
   3. (in combination)dreamland Related adjective: oneiric
2. 1. a sequence of imaginative thoughts indulged in while awake; daydream; fantasy
   2. (as modifier)a dream world
3. a person or thing seen or occurring in a dream
4. a cherished hope; ambition; aspiration
5. a vain hope
6. a person or thing that is as pleasant, or seemingly unreal, as a dream
7. go like a dream to move, develop, or work very well

verb dreams, dreaming, dreamed or dreamt (drɛmt)

8. (may take a clause as object) to undergo or experience (a dream or dreams)
9. (intr) to indulge in daydreams
10. (intr) to suffer delusions; be unrealisticyou’re dreaming if you think you can win
11. (when intr, foll by of or about) to have an image (of) or fantasy (about) in or as if in a dream
12. (intr foll by of) to consider the possibility (of)I wouldn’t dream of troubling you

adjective

13. too good to be true; idealdream kitchen

See also dream up Derived Formsdreamful, adjectivedreamfully, adverbdreaming, noun, adjectivedreamingly, adverbdreamless, adjectivedreamlessly, adverbdreamlessness, noundreamlike, adjectiveWord Origin for dream Old English drēam song; related to Old High German troum, Old Norse draumr, Greek thrulos noise Word Origin and History for dreamed dream n.

mid-13c. in the sense “sequence of sensations passing through a sleeping person’s mind” (also as a verb), probably related to Old Norse draumr, Danish drøm, Swedish dröm, Old Saxon drom “merriment, noise,” Old Frisian dram “dream,” Dutch droom, Old High German troum, German traum “dream,” perhaps from West Germanic *draugmas “deception, illusion, phantasm” (cf. Old Saxon bidriogan, Old High German triogan, German trügen “to deceive, delude,” Old Norse draugr “ghost, apparition”). Possible cognates outside Germanic are Sanskrit druh- “seek to harm, injure,” Avestan druz- “lie, deceive.”

But Old English dream meant only “joy, mirth, noisy merriment,” also “music.” And much study has failed to prove that Old English dream is the root of the modern word for “sleeping vision,” despite being identical in spelling. Either the meaning of the word changed dramatically or “vision” was an unrecorded secondary Old English meaning of dream, or there are two separate words here. OED offers this theory: “It seems as if the presence of dream ‘joy, mirth, music,’ had caused dream ‘dream’ to be avoided, at least in literature, and swefn, lit. ‘sleep,’ to be substituted” ….

Words for “sleeping vision” in Old English were mæting and swefn. Old English swefn originally meant “sleep,” as did a great many Indo-European “dream” nouns, e.g. Lithuanian sapnas, Old Church Slavonic sunu, and the Romanic words (French songe, Spanish sueño, Italian sogno all from Latin somnium (from PIE *swep-no-; cognate with Greek hypnos; see somnolence; Old English swefn is from the same root). Dream in the sense of “ideal or aspiration” is from 1931, from earlier sense of “something of dream-like beauty or charm” (1888).

dream v.

c.1200 in the current sense, from dream (n.). Old English verb dremen meant “rejoice; play music.” Related: Dreamed; dreaming.

dreamed in Medicine dream [drēm] n.

1. A series of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations occurring involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep.

Idioms and Phrases with dreamed dream

In addition to the idioms beginning with dream

dream come true, a

dream up

also see:

pipe dream

sweet dreams

wouldn’t dream of