dormouse
UK /ˈdɔː.maʊs/ · US /ˈdɔɹ.maʊs/ noun
Forms dormice doormouse
- noun Any of several species of small, mostly European rodents of the family Gliridae.
- noun Glis glis (edible dormouse).
- noun (UK) Muscardinus avellanarius (hazel dormouse).
- noun (figuratively) A person who sleeps a great deal, or who falls asleep readily (by analogy with the sound hibernation of the dormouse).
Synonyms
Etymology
From Middle English dormowse, of uncertain origin. Possibly from a dialectal *dor-, from Old Norse dár (“benumbed”) + mous (“mouse”). More at doze, mouse.
The word is sometimes conjectured to come from an Anglo-Norman derivative of Old French dormir (“to sleep”) (as *dormouse (“tending to be dormant”), with second element mistaken for mouse), but no such Anglo-Norman term is known to have existed.
Webster’s 1913
- noun A small European rodent of the genus Myoxus, of several species. They live in trees and feed on nuts, acorns, etc.; --so called because they are usually torpid in winter.
Etymology [Perh. fr. F. dormir to sleep (Prov. E. dorm to doze) + E. mouse; or perh. changed fr. F. dormeuse, fem., a sleeper, though not found in the sense of a dormouse.]
Sources: Wiktionary · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “dormouse”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details