supine
IPA: sʌpˈaɪn
noun
- (grammar, also attributively) In Latin and other languages: a type of verbal noun used in the ablative and accusative cases, which shares the same stem as the passive participle.
- (grammar, also attributively) In Swedish, Faroese, Icelandic and Old Norse: a verb form that combines with an inflection of ha/hafa/hava to form the present perfect and pluperfect tenses.
- (grammar, also attributively) (obsolete terminology) The 'to'-prefixed infinitive in English or other Germanic languages, so named because the infinitive was regarded as a verbal noun and the 'to'-prefixed form of it was seen as the dative form of the verbal noun; the full infinitive.
adjective
- Lying on its back.
- (of the hand, forearm or foot) Turned facing toward the body or upward: with the thumb outward (palm up), or with the big toe raised relative to the little toe.
- (figuratively) Reluctant to take action due to indifference or moral weakness; apathetic or passive towards something.
- (rare, now poetic) Inclining or leaning backward; inclined, sloping.
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Examples of "supine" in Sentences
- Active operations have been begun before Petersburg, where the two armies had long lain supine.
- If you are wont to opine: “if you have done nothing wrong, then you have nothing to fear”, you will, of course, remain supine and do nothing.
- Still, you've got to ask yourself – how supine is a journalist who permits himself to be TOLD if he can or can't write down something he is told?
- Effects of VIAGRA on Blood Pressure: Single oral doses of sildenafil (100 mg) administered to healthy volunteers produced decreases in supine blood pressure.
- As long as the remote banks of the Niester were considered as the boundary of the Roman power, the fortifications of the Lower Danube were more carelessly guarded, and the inhabitants of Maesia lived in supine security, fondly conceiving themselves at an inaccessible distance from any barbarian invaders.
- Then there was President Bush talking about oil, and Hillary Clinton talking about health care, which caused me to realize that if you haven’t lain supine in a claustrophobia-inducing magnetized tunnel while watching Hillary Clinton talk about health care one inch from your eyeballs, well, you just haven’t lived.
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