Rouses

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. Causes someone to wake up from sleep or unconsciousness ; provokes an intense feeling or initiates action
2. Brings a person out of a sleeping state ; excites or energizes a reaction or mood
3. Awakens someone from rest or inactivity ; stimulates emotional or physical response in others

Etymology: The verb "rouse" is a puzzle that etymologists have not solved. It appears in Late Middle English as "rousen," used of a hawk shaking out its feathers, and no one has found a convincing source for it. Falconry borrowed many terms from French, so scholars long assumed a French origin, but the candidate French words differ too much in meaning to be accepted. Old Norse and Scots connections have also been proposed without settling the question. The modern senses of waking someone and stirring up a feeling seem to have grown from the older sense of agitation. Because the origin is so uncertain, the word's path from a bird's ruffled feathers to a sleeper's awakening is reconstructed rather than documented step by step. "Rouses" is simply the third-person singular form of the verb, so it follows the same history as the base word.

Synonyms: awakens, stimulates, excites

Antonyms: puts to sleep, calms