English

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Etymology

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From Middle English sojourne (noun) and sojournen (verb), from Old French sojor, sojorner (modern séjour, séjourner), from (assumed) Vulgar Latin *subdiurnāre, from Latin sub- (under, a little over) + Late Latin diurnus (lasting for a day), from Latin dies (day).[1]

Pronunciation

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Noun

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sojourn (plural sojourns)

  1. A short stay somewhere.
    • 1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XLIV, in Francesca Carrara. [], volume III, London: Richard Bentley, [], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 367:
      Better the dark, silent, and fated waves of ocean, than the troubled waves of life. There are some whose sojourn on this earth is brief as it is bitter.
    • 1978, Timothy C. Wong, edited by William Schultz, Wu Ching-tzu[1], Twayne Publishers, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 30:
      But if, as we have seen, Wu's ambivalent attitude toward the conventional route to success originated in his early appreciation of the idealistic virtues of his father, then it is possible that parts of the work could have been written much earlier, perhaps even during his sojourn with his father in Chiang-su.
    • 2006, Joseph Price Remington, Paul Beringer, Remington: The Science And Practice Of Pharmacy, page 1168:
      The use of vasoconstrictors to increase the sojourn of local anesthetics at the site of infiltration continues []
  2. A temporary residence.
    Synonym: (abroad, obsolete) peregrination
    • 1667, John Milton, “Book III”, in Paradise Lost. [], London: [] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker []; [a]nd by Robert Boulter []; [a]nd Matthias Walker, [], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: [], London: Basil Montagu Pickering [], 1873, →OCLC:
      Though long detain'd / In that obscure sojourn

Synonyms

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Derived terms

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Translations

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Verb

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sojourn (third-person singular simple present sojourns, present participle sojourning, simple past and past participle sojourned)

  1. (intransitive) To reside somewhere temporarily, especially as a guest or lodger.

Synonyms

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Translations

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References

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  1. ^ Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “sojourn”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.

Anagrams

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