fume
pronunciation
How to pronounce fume in British English:
UK [fjuːm]
How to pronounce fume in American English:
US [fjuːm]
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- Noun:
- a cloud of fine particles suspended in a gas
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- Verb:
- be mad, angry, or furious
- emit a cloud of fine particles
- treat with fumes, expose to fumes, especially with the aim of disinfecting or eradicating pests
- be wet with sweat or blood, as of one's face
Word Origin
- fume
- fume: [14] Fume comes via Old French fum from Latin fūmus ‘smoke, steam’. This in turn went back to a prehistoric Indo-European *dhūmo-, which also produced Sanskrit dhūmás ‘smoke’ and Russian and Polish dym ‘smoke’. The word’s verbal use, ‘be very angry’, comes, like seethe, from the notion of being ‘hot or steaming with fury’. Derived words in English include fumigate [16] and perfume.=> fumigate, perfume
- fume (n.)
- late 14c., "vapor, odorous vapor; exhalation," from Old French fum "smoke, steam, vapor, breath, aroma, scent" (12c.), from Latin fumus "smoke, steam, fume, old flavor" (source also of Italian fumo, Spanish humo), from PIE *dheu- (1) "dust, vapor, smoke; to rise in a cloud, to fly about (like dust)" (cognates: Sanskrit dhumah, Old Church Slavonic dymu, Lithuanian dumai, Old Prussian dumis "smoke," Middle Irish dumacha "fog," Greek thymos "spirit, mind, soul"). In medieval physiology, an "exhalation" of the body that produces emotions, dreams, sloth, etc; later especially of smokes or vapors that go to the head and affect the senses with a narcotic or stifling quality.
- fume (v.)
- c. 1400, "to fumigate" (transitive), from Old French fumer "to smoke, burn" (12c.), from Latin fumare "to smoke, steam," from fumus "smoke, steam, fume" (see fume (n.)). Intransitive meaning "throw off smoke, emit vapor" is from 1530s; the figurative sense "show anger, be irritated" is slightly earlier (1520s). Related: Fumed; fumes; fuming.
Example
- 1. On the right , well-heeled americans fume that nearly half of all households pay no federal income tax .
- 2. But at the honda plant , employees fume more about the factory 's trade union than about japanese managers .
- 3. Where they struggled to survive the dust and fume from a busy main road .
- 4. Why does the orb fume with it ?
- 5. Your harsh words put her in a fume .