Etimology
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”).
noun
dream (plural dreams)
Imaginary events seen in the mind while sleeping.
(figurative) A hope or wish.
A visionary scheme; a wild conceit; an idle fancy.
Examples
Synonym: sweven
Hyponym: nightmare
have a dream
scary dream
vivid dream
erotic dream
feel like a dream
be in a dream
Dreams are but interludes which fancy makes.
She wakened in sharp panic, bewildered by the grotesquerie of some half-remembered dream in contrast with the harshness of inclement fact, drowsily realising that since she had fallen asleep it had come on to rain smartly out of a shrouded sky.
And I find it kind of funny, I find it kind of sad The dreams in which I'm dying are the best I've ever had
have a dream
fulfil a dream
harbour a dream
realize a dream
So this was my future home, I thought! […] Backed by towering hills, the but faintly discernible purple line of the French boundary off to the southwest, a sky of palest Gobelin flecked with fat, fleecy little clouds, it in truth looked a dear little city; the city of one's dreams.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. I have a dream today!
Ralph Wiggum is generally employed as a bottomless fount of glorious non sequiturs, but in “I Love Lisa” he stands in for every oblivious chump who ever deluded himself into thinking that with persistence, determination, and a pure heart he can win the girl of his dreams.
More likely than capture is death at the hands of Chinese border police. Killings like that of fifteen-year-old Yeshe Dundrub, shot at night in Saga County in November 1999, while fleeing with forty others to Nepal, are covered up when possible.
Synonym: vision
live in a dream
wake up from a dream
impossible dream
a dream of bliss
the dream of his youth
There sober thought pursued the amusing theme, Till Fancy coloured it and formed a dream.
It is not, then, a mere dream, but a very real aim which they propose.
verb
dream (third-person singular simple present dreams, present participle dreaming, simple past and past participle dreamed or dreamt)
(intransitive) To see imaginary events in one's mind while sleeping.
(intransitive) To hope, to wish.
(intransitive) To daydream.
(transitive) To envision as an imaginary experience (usually when asleep).
(intransitive) To consider the possibility (of).
Examples
Last night I dreamed of cupcakes and chocolate cookies.
Dreaming when Dawn's Left Hand was in the SkyI heard a Voice within the Tavern cry,"Awake, my Little ones, and fill the CupBefore Life's Liquor in its Cup be dry."
Lucy dreams of becoming a scientist when she'll grow up.
Stop dreaming and get back to work.
I dreamed a vivid dream last night.
And still they dream that they shall still succeed.
At length in sleep their bodies they compose, / And dreamt the future fight, and early rose.
I wouldn't dream of snubbing you in public.
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
But then I had the [massive] flintlock by me for protection. […] The linen-press and a chest on the top of it formed, however, a very good gun-carriage; and, thus mounted, aim could be taken out of the window […], and a 'bead' could be drawn upon Molly, the dairymaid, kissing the fogger behind the hedge, little dreaming that the deadly tube was levelled at them.
adjective
dream (not comparable)
Ideal; perfect.
Examples
If a girl who talked like that was not his dream girl, he didn't know a dream girl when he heard one.
England found chances a rarity, although Liverpool striker Solanke almost made it a dream debut in the closing seconds, only to miscontrol at the far post.