nightmare

 

nightmare (n.)

c. 1300, "an evil female spirit afflicting men (or horses) in their sleep with a feeling of suffocation," compounded from night + mare (n.3) "goblin that causes nightmares, incubus." The meaning shifted mid-16c. from the incubus to the suffocating sensation it causes. Sense of "any bad dream" is recorded by 1829; that of "very distressing experience" is from 1831.

Cognate with Middle Dutch nachtmare, German Nachtmahr. An Old English word for it was niht-genga. An 11c. gloss gives, for Latin Echo, Anglo-Saxon wudumær, a "wood-mere."

In the Anglo-Saxon superstitions, the Echo was supposed to be a spirit which dwelt in the wilds and mocked people who passed there, as the night-mare tormented people in bed. [Thomas Wright, "Anglo-Saxon and Old English Vocabularies," 1884]

also from c. 1300

Entries linking to nightmare

mare (n.3)

"night-goblin, incubus, oppressed sleep," Old English mare "incubus, nightmare, monster; witch, sorcerer," from mera, mære, from Proto-Germanic *maron "goblin" (source also of Middle Low German mar, Middle Dutch mare, Old High German mara, German Mahr "incubus," Old Norse mara "nightmare, incubus").

This is from PIE *mora- "incubus" (source also of first element in Old Irish Morrigain "demoness of the corpses," literally "queen of the nightmare," also Bulgarian, Serbian mora, Czech mura, Polish zmora "incubus").

Also compare French cauchemar "nightmare," with first element from Old French caucher "to trample" and second element from Germanic.

All this is probably from PIE root *mer- "to rub away, harm" (also "to die" and forming words referring to death and to beings subject to death).

The word in English now survives only in nightmare (q.v.). In a very early Anglo-Saxon text Latin echo is glossed with wudumer "*woodmare."

night (n.)

late Old English niht (West Saxon neaht, Anglian næht, neht) "the dark part of a day; the night as a unit of time; darkness," also "absence of spiritual illumination, moral darkness, ignorance," from Proto-Germanic *nahts (source also of Old Saxon and Old High German naht, Old Frisian and Dutch nacht, German Nacht, Old Norse natt, Gothic nahts).

The Germanic words are from PIE *nekwt- "night" (source also of Greek nyx "a night," Latin nox, Old Irish nochd, Sanskrit naktam "at night," Lithuanian naktis "night," Old Church Slavonic nosti, Russian noch', Welsh henoid "tonight"), according to Watkins, probably from a verbal root *neg- "to be dark, be night." For spelling with -gh- see fight.  The vowel indicates that the modern English word derives from oblique cases (genitive nihte, dative niht).

The fact that the Aryans have a common name for night, but not for day (q.v.), is due to the fact that they reckoned by nights. [Weekley]

Thus in Old English combinations night was "the night before (a certain day or feast day);" compare German Weihnachten "Christmas," literally "holy night." In early times, the day was held to begin at sunset, so Old English monanniht "Monday night" was the night before Monday, or what we would call Sunday night; so saeterniht "Friday night." The Greeks, by contrast, counted their days by mornings.

To work nights preserves the Old English genitive of time. Night soil "excrement" (1770) is so called because it was removed (from cesspools, etc.) after dark. Night train is attested from 1838; night-school from 1520s; night-life "habitual nocturnal carousing" is attested from 1852.

nightmarish

*mer-

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Trends of nightmare

pant

puff, pant, be out of breath, be in distress" (12c.), which is probably from Vulgar Latin *pantasiare "be oppressed with a nightmare..., struggle for breathing during a nightmare," literally "to have visions," from Greek phantasioun "have or form images, subject...

Orwellian

It is as if George Orwell had conceived the nightmare instead of analyzed it, helped to create it instead of helping to dispel...

grouch

He seemed perpetually to carry the Hoof-Marks of a horrible Nightmare....

mask

French masque "covering to hide or guard the face" (16c.), from Italian maschera, from Medieval Latin masca "mask, specter, nightmare...

geek

form and the popular use with reference to circus sideshow "wild men" is from 1946, in William Lindsay Gresham's novel "Nightmare...

elf

The Germanic elf originally was dwarfish and malicious (compare elf-lock "knot in hair," Old English ælfadl "nightmare,"...

mascot

from masco "witch," from Old Provençal masca, itself of unknown origin, perhaps from Medieval Latin masca "mask, specter, nightmare...

dream

"sequence of sensations or images passing through the mind of a sleeping person," mid-13c., 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." Thes

situation

early 15c., situacioun, "place, position, or location," from Old French situacion or directly from Medieval Latin situationem (nominative situatio) "a position, situation," noun of action from past-participle stem of situare "to place, locate," from Latin situs "a place, position

keep

Middle English kēpen, from late Old English cepan (past tense cepte) "to seize, hold; seek after, desire," also "to observe or carry out in practice; look out for, regard, pay attention to," from Proto-Germanic *kopjan, which is of uncertain origin. Old English cepan was used c.

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