Trance

How to spell trance

6 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce trance

What does trance mean?

1. nounA half-conscious or dreamlike state in which a person is unresponsive to their surroundings.

Trance in a sentence

• The long drive on the empty motorway left her in a trance.

• The hypnotist guided his subject gently into a trance.

Where does trance come from?

Language of origin: French

This word reached English in the late 1300s from the Old French noun transe, which described a state of dread, a fainting fit, or even the passage from life into death. That French word came from the verb transir, meaning to pass over or to die, and it traces back to the Latin transire, to go across or pass through, formed from trans, meaning across, and ire, meaning to go. The original sense was darker than today's: it suggested the moment of crossing from the living world toward the next. Over the centuries the meaning softened into a suspended, dreamlike state of consciousness, and by modern times it also names a genre of repetitive electronic dance music. The buried Latin trans, the same element in transit and transfer, is a useful reminder that the spelling carries an n before the c.

How the word is built

• trans- (across)
• -ce (from Latin ire, to go); literally a 'passing over' into another state