Definition of DREAM

dream

Plural: dreams

Noun

  • a series of mental images and emotions occurring during sleep
    • "I had a dream about you last night"
  • imaginative thoughts indulged in while awake
    • "he lives in a dream that has nothing to do with reality"
  • a cherished desire
  • a fantastic but vain hope (from fantasies induced by the opium pipe)
    • "I have this pipe dream about being emperor of the universe"
  • a state of mind characterized by abstraction and release from reality
    • "he went about his work as if in a dream"
  • someone or something wonderful
    • "this dessert is a dream"
  • Imaginary events seen in the mind while sleeping.
  • A hope or wish.
  • A visionary scheme; a wild conceit; an idle fancy.

Verb

Verb Forms: dreamed, dreamt, dreaming, dreams

  • To experience a series of thoughts and images during sleep.
  • have a daydream; indulge in a fantasy
  • experience while sleeping
    • "She claims to never dream"
    • "He dreamt a strange scene"
  • To see imaginary events in one's mind while sleeping.
  • To hope, to wish.
  • To daydream.
  • To envision as an imaginary experience (usually when asleep).
  • To consider the possibility (of).

Adj

  • Ideal; perfect.

Examples

  • a dream of bliss
  • be in a dream
  • erotic dream
  • feel like a dream
  • fulfil a dream
  • harbour a dream
  • have a dream
  • I dreamed a vivid dream last night.
  • I often dream of finding a seven-letter word on my first Scrabble turn.
  • I wouldn't dream of snubbing you in public.
  • impossible dream
  • Last night I dreamed I was leaping over giant cupcakes and chocolate cookies.
  • live in a dream
  • Lucy dreams of becoming a scientist when she'll grow up.
  • realize a dream
  • scary dream
  • Stop dreaming and get back to work.
  • the dream of his youth
  • vivid dream
  • wake up from a dream

Origin / Etymology

From Middle English drem, from Old English drēam (“music, joy”), from Proto-West Germanic *draum, from Proto-Germanic *draumaz, from earlier *draugmaz, from Proto-Indo-European *dʰrowgʰ-mos, from *dʰrewgʰ- (“to deceive, injure, damage”).
The sense of "dream", though not attested in Old English, may still have been present (compare Old Saxon drōm (“bustle, revelry, jubilation", also "dream”)), and was undoubtedly reinforced later in Middle English by Old Norse draumr (“dream”), from same Proto-Germanic root.
Cognate with Scots dreme (“dream”), North Frisian drom (“dream”), West Frisian dream (“dream”), Low German Droom, Dutch droom (“dream”), German Traum (“dream”), Danish and Norwegian Bokmål drøm, Norwegian Nynorsk draum, Swedish dröm (“dream”), Icelandic draumur (“dream”). Related also to Old Norse draugr (“ghost, undead, spectre”), Dutch bedrog (“deception, deceit”), German Trug (“deception, illusion”).
more details
The derivation from Old English drēam is controversial, since the word itself is only attested in writing in its meaning of “joy, mirth, musical sound”. Possibly there was a separate word drēam meaning “images seen while sleeping”, which was avoided in literature due to potential confusion with the “joy” sense. Otherwise, the modern sense must have been borrowed from another Germanic language, most probably Old Norse. Since this is the common sense in all Germanic languages outside the British isles, a spontaneous development from “joy, mirth” to “dream” in Middle English is hardly conceivable. In Old Saxon, the cognate drōm did mean “dream”, but was a rare word.
Attested words for “sleeping vision” in Old English, both of which appeared in The Dream of the Rood, were mǣting (Middle English mæte, mete), from an unclear source, and swefn (Modern English sweven), from Proto-Germanic *swefnaz, from Proto-Indo-European *swepno-, *swep-; compare Ancient Greek ὕπνος (húpnos, “sleep”).
The verb is from Middle English dremen, possibly (see above) from Old English drīeman (“to make a joyous sound with voice or with instrument; rejoice; sing a song; play on an instrument”), from Proto-Germanic *draumijaną, *draugmijaną (“to be festive, dream, hallucinate”), from the noun. Cognate with Scots dreme (“to dream”), West Frisian dreame (“to dream”), Dutch dromen (“to dream”), German träumen (“to dream”), Swedish drömma (“to dream, muse”), Icelandic dreyma (“to dream”).

Scrabble Score: 8

dream: valid Scrabble (US) TWL Word
dream: valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
dream: valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary

Words With Friends Score: 9

dream: valid Words With Friends Word