See Also: Nightmare(medicine)
nightmare(1)(dictionary)
nightmare(2)(dictionary)
nightmare(dictionary)
Nightmare on Elm Street, A(dictionary)

nightmare(1) (iou)



nightmare noun & adjective. ME.
[from NIGHT noun + MARE noun2.]
A. noun.
A female spirit or monster supposed to settle on and produce a feeling of suffocation in a sleeping person or animal. ME.
Tennyson King Arthur panted hard Like one that feels a nightmare on his bed.
Orig. (usu. the nightmare), a feeling of suffocation or great distress felt during sleep. Now usu., a bad dream producing these or similar sensations; an oppressive or terrifying or fantastically horrible dream, fear, or experience. M16.
W. Golding He was breathing quickly like a man in the first stages of nightmare. V. Cronin His sleep was troubled by dreadful nightmares. E. Leonard He needed to..put the nightmare of prison out of his mind. Lancaster Guardian The tax would be..a bureaucratic nightmare.
b. attrib. or as adjective. Of the nature of a nightmare, nightmarish. M19.
T. S. Eliot You've had a cream of a nightmare dream. S. Naipaul Nightmare visions of imminent fascist take-over and genocidal doom.
nightmarey adjective nightmarish M19.
nightmarish adjective of the nature of a nightmare; oppressive or terrifying enough to cause nightmares: M19.
nightmarishly adverb L19.