cheirar

Galician

Etymology

From Old Galician and Old Galician-Portuguese cheirar (“to smell”) (13th, Cantigas de Santa Maria) from Vulgar Latin or Late Latin flāgrāre, present active infinitive of flāgrō, by dissimilation from Latin frāgrō, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰreh₂gro-, from *bʰreh₂g- (“to smell”) + *-ro-.

Cognate to Catalan flairar, English flair (through Old French flair), French flairer, Portuguese cheirar and Occitan flairar.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /t͡ʃejˈɾaɾ/

Verb

1. (transitive) to smell (to perceive a smell with the nose)

   Cheiro a comida? ― Am I smelling food?

2. (transitive) to sniff
3. (intransitive) to stink

   Cheiras. ― You stink.

4. (intransitive, figurative) to tire, bore, annoy

   As visitas e o pescado, ós dous días cheiran. (proverb) ― Visitors and fish, both "stink" the second day.

5. Template:indtr to smell of (have the smell of)

   Cheira a comida. ― It smells like food.

6. (figurative) to sniff around, snoop

   Que andas a cheirar no meu cuarto? ― What are you doing in my room?

Synonyms

• (to have the smell of): ulir, recender
• (to have a strong bad smell): feder, alcatrear, abafar

Derived terms

• cheira que recende
• cheiro

Related terms

• cheiracús
• cheirón
• cheirume
• cheirento

References

• Template:R:DDGM
• Xavier Varela Barreiro, Xavier Gómez Guinovart (2006–2018) “cheir”, in Corpus Xelmírez - Corpus lingüístico da Galicia medieval (in Galician), Santiago de Compostela: ILG
• Template:R:DDLG
• Template:R:TILG
• Rosario Álvarez Blanco, editor (2014–2024), “cheirar”, in Tesouro do léxico patrimonial galego e portugués (in Galician), Santiago de Compostela: Instituto da Lingua Galega, →ISSN

---

Portuguese

Etymology

From Old Galician-Portuguese cheirar (“to smell”), from Vulgar Latin, Late Latin flāgrāre, present active infinitive of flāgrō, by dissimilation from Latin frāgrō, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰreh₂gro-, from *bʰreh₂g- (“to smell”) + *-ro-.

Cognate to Catalan flairar, English flair (through Old French flair), French flairer, Galician cheirar and Occitan flairar.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ʃɐj.ˈɾaɾ/, /ʃej.ˈɾaɾ/
• Hyphenation: chei‧rar

Verb

1. (transitive) to smell (to perceive a smell with the nose)

   Eu não consigo cheirar nada.

   I can't smell anything.

2. Template:indtr to smell of (have the smell of)

   Esse perfume cheira a chocolate.

   That perfume smells like chocolate.

3. (transitive, intransitive) to snort (to use cocaine)

Synonyms

• (to have the smell of): exalar, odorar
• (to have a strong bad smell): feder, tresandar

Derived terms

• cheirador
• cheiricar
• cheiro

Related terms

• fragrância
• fragrante

See also

• farejar
• perfume