swoon meaning: definition, etymology and quotations

swoon

noun

/swuːn/ · /suːn/

Etymology From Middle English swoune, swone, from the verb (see below).

A faint.

She dandled it, and dancet it up and doune, / Not ceasing till she rais'd it from his swoune.1593, Thomas Nashe, The Choice of Valentines, lines 138-139:
"I felt my strength fading away, and I was in a half swoon. How long this horrible thing lasted I know not, but it seemed that a long time must have passed before he took his foul, awful, sneering mouth away. I saw it drip with the fresh blood!"1897, Bram Stoker, Dracula, Westminster [London]: Archibald Constable and Company, […], →OCLC:

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As he drew near the throne, a rushing whirlwind arose in the corner of the hall and, lo! from the roof beams floated down a monstrous black serpent that coiled itself up on the very seat of majesty. The Emperor fell in a swoon.14th century CE, Guanzhong, L., “1. Three Heroes Swear Brotherhood In The Peach Garden; One Victory Shatters The Rebels In Battlegrounds.”, in Brewitt-Taylor, C. H., transl., Romance of the Three Kingdoms, published 1925, archived from the original on 25 Jan 2022:

An infatuation.

Derived terms: Swoonatra, swoon hypothesis, swoon set

swoon

verb

Etymology From Middle English swounen, swonen (“to faint”), and aswoune (“in a swoon”), both ultimately from Old English ġeswōgen (“insensible, senseless, dead”), past participle of swōgan (“to make a sound, overrun, suffocate”) (compare Old English āswōgan (“to cover over, overcome”)), from Proto-West Germanic *swōgan, from Proto-Germanic *swōganą (“to make a noise”), from Proto-Indo-European *sweh₂gʰ-. Cognates Cognate with German Low German swogen, swögen (“to faint, sigh, groan”), Dutch zwoegen (“to groan, breathe heavily”), dialectal Norwegian søgja (“to whistle, hum, talk loudly”). More at sough.

Literally To faint, to lose consciousness.

I threw myself down on the island ground, like a dead man, and drowned in desolation swooned away, nor did I return to my senses till next morning, when the sun rose and revived me.1885, Richard F. Burton, The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Night 539:
I dropped the vessel quickly to a lower level. Nor was I a moment too soon. The girl had swooned.1913 January–May, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “The Gods of Mars”, in The All-Story, New York, N.Y.: Frank A. Munsey Co., →OCLC; republished as “A Fair Goddess”, in The Gods of Mars, Chicago, Ill.: A[lexander] C[aldwell] McClurg & Co., September 1918, →OCLC, page 107:

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He's got more than just mad skill / He's got a beaver tail and a bill. / And the women swoon whenever they hear him say…2011 August 2, “Perry the Platypus”, in Phineas and Ferb: Across the 1st and 2nd Dimensions, performed by Randy Crenshaw, Walt Disney Records:

Broadly To be overwhelmed by emotion, especially infatuation.

To overwhelm with emotion, especially infatuation.

That plush mustache of yours has completely swooned me!2004, Intelligent Systems, translated by Nintendo of America, Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, Nintendo, GameCube, level/area: Boggly Woods:

To make a moan, sigh, or some other sound expressing infatuation or affection.

The girls swooned at the picture of their favorite actor.
2013 (November 2), Pinky, 10 minutes into episode 25 ("The Spy Who Slimed Me") of TV series "Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures" per closed captions [Swoons] For sure. He's totally dreamy. Uh--but my heart still belongs to you, Pac-ums.

Derived terms: aswoon, swooner, swooningly, swoonless, swoonsome, swoonworthy, swoony, unswooning

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