sleepwaker
English
[edit]Etymology
[edit]Pronunciation
[edit]Noun
[edit]sleepwaker (plural sleepwakers)
- (archaic) One in a state of magnetic or mesmeric sleep; someone in a hypnotic trance.
- 1842 March, Chauncy Hare Townshend, “Facts in Mesmerism, or Animal Magnetism”, in The New Jerusalem Magazine, volume 15, number 175, page 269:
- I once asked a sleepwaker whether she could perceive any analogy between animal and mineral magnetism, when she replied, ' There is an analogy — but the latter is of a coarser nature.'
- 1845 March 29, Charles Radclyffe Hall, “On the Rise, Progress, and Mysteries of Mesmerism”, in The Lancet, volume 1, page 234:
- Another sleepwaker informed her magnetiser that if he would breathe upon his hand, and then lay it on her forehead, his power would be increased.
- 1877, Clairvoyancy, Mind-reading, Psychomancy, and Soul-charming, page 39:
- A lady present when Mademoiselle M——had been mesmerized by me, went up to the sleepwaker and spoke to her for some time.
- (rare, obsolete) A sleepwalker; one who walks in their sleep.
- 1840, Chauncy Hare Townshend, Facts in Mesmerism, page 236:
- As I have before said, he had been, in shildhood, a natural sleepwaker; and I now add , on the testimony of his father, that he would sometimes rise in the night, take out his flute, ( an instru- ment which he was studying professionally,) place music before him, and play from notes, continuing to turn over the leaves of the music-book correctly, although his eyes were closely shut.
- 1860, Karl Freiherr von Reichenbach, Somnambulism and Cramp, page 238:
- He begins to speak, arises from his bed, walks about, and now becomes a sleepwaker.
- 1965, Science Digest, volume 58, page 37:
- In addition, about 4 million Americans are occasional or habitual sleepwakers.