to lie dormant
12
6.7
- phrasal verb
- /laɪ ˈdɔːrmənt/
:
estar latente
- When the planet is cool, life exists but lies dormant, like perennials in the ground back home, waiting for spring.
It's important if we have things that are lying dormant inside of a character.
- It's important if we have things that are lying dormant inside of a character.
- Where is that consciousness hiding, lying dormant?
- During the day they lie dormant, but at night they come out to feast.
- This may have been lying dormant in adulthood, especially if you were able to create some distance between yourself and your parent.
- But if you don't know your gift, if you don't know your gift yet, you don't just lay dormant, you don't just not move.
Examples
-
In winter, the bugs lie dormant in weeds.
Academic text (1999) -
Feelings that had lain dormant for a year and a half raged again.
Blog text (24) -
After years of lying dormant, she was building an army, getting ready to strike.
-
Very well results in the development of skills that would otherwise lie dormant.
Academic text (1994) -
During the day they lie dormant, but at night they come out to feast.
-
The adverse safety effects of these decisions may lie dormant for a very long time.
Academic text (2003) -
Often they lie dormant, only to rise up again at the least convenient moment.
Academic text (2007) -
The threat had roused Charity's executive instincts, which had lain dormant for months.
Fiction book (1997) -
After the initial exposure, herpes zoster lies dormant in certain nerve fibers.
Academic text (2005) -
The bacteria that cause TB can lie dormant for decades in a healthy person.
Synonyms
1
3.2
To spend time doing nothing
Antonyms
How Dormant
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'to be inactive but capable of becoming active later' is directly and transparently derived from combining 'lie' (to be in a state or position) with 'dormant' (temporarily inactive yet capable of later development). This adjective-phrase composition follows standard, cross-linguistic patterns and would be readily understood by a B1 learner who knows both constituent words.
Etymology
Lie dormant shows something that lies quietly, like a seed under the soil or a sleeping volcano, with dormant meaning it is not active now. So the phrase means 'not active now' but able to 'wake up' later.