English

Adjective

cumbent ‎(comparative more cumbent, superlative most cumbent)

1. lying down, recumbent
   • 1841, Matthew Holbeche Bloxam, The Principles of Gothic Ecclesiastical Architecture, Elucidated by Question and Answer, 4th ed.:

     Altar-tombs with cumbent effigies were painted so as to correspond in tone with the colours displayed on the walls; the pavement of encaustic tiles, of different devices, was interspersed with sepulchral slabs and inlaid brasses; and screen-work, niches for statuary, mouldings, and sculpture of different degrees of excellence, abounded.

   • 1852, Mrs. David Osborne, The World of Waters:

     The only tree growing in Spitzbergen is the dwarf willow, which rises to the vast height of two inches! towering with great pride above the mosses, lichens, and a few other cumbent plants."

   • 1870, Epes Sargent, The Woman Who Dared:

     While thus she mused, she started at a cry: "Ah! here's our siren, cumbent on the rocks!

   • 1888, Daniel Defoe, From London to Land's End:

     Hereford is the dirtiest old city I have seen in England, yet pretty large; the streets are irregular and the houses old, and its cathedral a reverend old pile, but not beautiful; the niches of the walls of the church are adorned with the figures of its bishops as big as the life, in a cumbent posture, with the year of their interments newly painted over.