land of Nod

English

Etymology

From Genesis 4:16,[1] first used by Jonathan Swift as a play on words for the modern-day meaning. Compare nod off.

Pronunciation
  • (UK) IPA(key): /ˈlænd əv ˈnɒd/
  • (US) IPA(key): /ˈlænd əv ˈnɑd/

Proper noun

the land of Nod

  1. (poetic) The state of sleep, or an imaginary place that one inhabits when asleep.
    • 1731 (date written), Simon Wagstaff [pseudonym; Jonathan Swift], “Dialogue III”, in A Complete Collection of Genteel and Ingenious Conversation, […], London: […] B[enjamin] Motte […], published 1738, →OCLC, page 214:
      Neverout. Why, miss, if you fall asleep, somebody may get a pair of gloves. / Col. I'm going to the land of Nod.
    • 1885, Robert Louis Stevenson, “The Land of Nod”, in A Child's Garden of Verses‎:
      From breakfast on through all the day / At home among my friends I stay; / But every night I go abroad / Afar into the land of Nod.
    • 1892, Wenona Gilman [pseudonym; Florence Blackburn White Schoeffel], chapter XXX, in Leonie, The Typewriter‎, New York: Norman L. Munro:
      […] but she was too tired for anything under heaven to disturb her, and after a moment of wakeful dreaming she was in the land of Nod!

Translations
Translations

References
  1. The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], 1611, →OCLC, Genesis 4:16.: “And Cain went out from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of Nod, on the East of Eden.”

Further reading
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