Forms: ? 5–6 benome, 6 benomme, 6–8 benum, -numm(e, 7–8 benumn, 6– benumb. [A verb of late origination, f. prec.; cf. for sense to lame, etc., for formation to astound. Benumb is a bad spelling of benum, after dumb, limb, etc.]
1. trans. To make (any part of the body) insensible, torpid, or powerless; occas. to stupefy or stun, as by a blow or shock; but now mostly used of the effects of cold.
1530. Palsgr., 448/2. I benomme, I make lame or take awaye the use of ones lymmes.
1579. Spenser, Sheph. Cal., Aug., 4. Or hath the Crampe thy ioynts benomd with ache?
1580. North, Plutarch (1676), 348. The tile … brake his neck-bone asunder … wherewith he was so suddenly benummed, that he lost his sight with the blow.
a. 1623. Sir J. Beaumont, Ode Blessed Trin. No cold shall thee benumme, Nor darknesse taint thy sight.
1651. Hobbes, Leviath., I. ii. 6. The Organs of Sense being now benummed.
1706. Addison, Rosamond, II. vi. Wks. 1726, I. 122. The sleep of death benumbs all o’er My fainting limbs.
1861. Swinhoe, N. China Camp., 370. The excessive cold benumbs all kinds of game to comparative tameness.
2. To render (the mental powers, the will, or the feelings) senseless or inert; to stupefy, deaden.
c. 1485. Digby Myst. (1882), II. 374. It rauysshid hym, and his spirites did be-nome.
1563. Myrr. for Mag., Somerset, ix. Did ever madnes man so much benomme.
1580. Sidney, Arcadia (1622), 107. Mopsa was benummed with joy when the Princesse gaue it her.
1665. Glanvill, Sceps. Sci., xxiv. 147. There are few but find some Companies benumn and cramp them.
1781. Gibbon, Decl. & F., III. liii. 303. A lethargy of servitude had benumbed the minds of the Greeks.
1818. Byron, Ch. Har., IV. xix. Some feelings Time can not benumb.
absol. 1667. Milton, P. L., II. 73. If the sleepy drench Of that forgetful Lake benumme not still.
3. fig. To paralyze.
1789. T. Jefferson, Wks. (1859), II. 589. The accident in England has benumbed her mediation between the Swedes and Danes. Ibid. (1825), Autobiog., I. 78. To benumb the action of the Federal government.
