Dictionary

benumb en · VERB

Pronunciation

• (US) audio
• /biˈnʌm/
• bē-nŭmʹ

Etymology

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₁ep-der. Proto-Indo-European *h₁épsder. Proto-Indo-European *h₁épider. Proto-Indo-European *h₁pi Proto-Germanic *bider. Proto-Germanic *bi- Proto-West Germanic *bi- Old English be- Middle English bi- English be- English numb English benumb From be- + numb.

Meanings

1. (transitive) To make numb, as by cold or anesthetic.
   • […] the Cold was insufferable; nor indeed was it more painful than it was surprising, to come but ten Days before out of the old Castile where the Weather was not only warm but very hot, and immediately to feel a Wind from the Pyrenean Mountains, so very keen, so severely cold, as to be intollerable, and to endanger benumbing and perishing of our Fingers and Toes. 1719 May 6 (Gregorian calendar), [Daniel Defoe], The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, […], London: […] W[illiam] Taylor […], →OCLC, page 344:
   • ‘My hands are so benumbed with the cold that I can scarcely handle my knife and fork.’ 1847 December, Acton Bell [pseudonym; Anne Brontë], chapter 2, in Agnes Grey. […], London: Thomas Cautley Newby, […], →OCLC:
   • […] the sayd Phillip […] in the same his pilgrimage was stricken with such colde, that he fell into a palsey, and was benumbed of the right side of his body. 1563 March 30 (Gregorian calendar), John Foxe, Actes and Monuments of These Latter and Perillous Dayes, […], London: […] Iohn Day, […], →OCLC, book II, page [233]:
2. (figuratively, transitive) To deaden, dull (the mind, faculties, etc.).
   • Five nights a week, six hours a day, for the next four months—and, fortunately, never again—I made my living by exhibiting the peculiar way I am formed. The Clinic had prepared me for it, benumbing my sense of shame, and besides, I was desperate for money. 2002, Jeffrey Eugenides, “Hermaphroditus”, in Middlesex, New York: Picador, page 483:
   • […] If this law Of nature be corrupted through affection, And that great minds, of partial indulgence To their benumbed wills, resist the same, There is a law in each well-order’d nation To curb those raging appetites that are Most disobedient and refractory. c. 1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Troylus and Cressida”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene ii]:
   • I struggled, and trembled, and was so benumb’d with Terror, that I sunk down, not in a Fit, and yet not myself […] 1741, [Samuel Richardson], “Letter XI”, in Pamela: Or, Virtue Rewarded. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), London: […] C[harles] Rivington, […]; and J. Osborn, […], →OCLC, page 18:
   • Sorrowful isolation had benumbed her sense of reality, and the power of distinguishing outward and inward was continually slipping away from her. 1876, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], chapter 17, in Daniel Deronda, volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC:

Forms

Deriveds

benumbedness · benumber · benumbingly · unbenumb · benumbed · benumbment