Wakened

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. Stopped sleeping and became conscious ;
2. Began to be alert after sleeping ;
3. Shifted from a state of sleep to being awake ;

Etymology: "Wakened" is the past tense and past participle of "waken," so its story is really the story of "waken." That verb descends from Old English "wæcnan," which meant to come into being or to arise, and it carries the same root as "wake." The Old English form was a verb built on the same Proto-Germanic base, *waknaną, that also gave English its word for becoming alert. In other words, the sense of stirring from sleep is only one of the things the root could express; its earliest uses were about something coming to life or starting up. Middle English later shaped it into "waknen," and the modern spelling settled into "waken," with "wakened" following the regular pattern for past forms. The verb has always had a close relationship with "wake," which has the same ancestry and carries the same basic idea of moving from sleep to consciousness. Today the two are close in meaning, though "wake" is far more common in everyday speech, and "waken" tends to sound more formal or literary.

Synonyms: awakened, roused

Antonyms: asleep, slumbering