somnambulist
[sɒmˈnæmbjʊlɪst]
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 1.65 in modern English
18
Scrabble Score
12
Letters
4
Syllables
10
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A person who walks about in their sleep; a sleepwalker.
Example Sentences
- "The clergyman floundered a moment, as is usual with an absent man who is recovering the train of his ideas, or a somnambulist when he is suddenly awakened."
- "The slim one got up and walked straight at me - still knitting with downcast eyes - and only just as I began to think of getting out of her way, as you would for a somnambulist, stood still, and looked up."
- "He must have promptly rejected an alternative explanation which would better fulfill the demands of verisimilitude (“My wife, poor thing, in her nervous condition, now is afflicted also with sleepwalking!”), seeing the laborious tasks to which the resumed somnambulist devotes herself: kneeling at the edge of a pit, she anoints the earth with murky philters (unless the implements she holds in her hand are to be interpreted actually as acetylene torches scattering sparks, to melt the lead seals of a coffin)."
Etymology
Borrowed from French somnambuliste, from Medieval Latin somnambulus (“sleepwalker”). By surface analysis, somn- + -ambulist.
Origin
- Source language: French
Word Breakdown
- Root: somnambuliste, somnambulus
Regional Pronunciation
- British English: [sɒmˈnæmbjʊlɪst]