damp

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Archived revision by ToilBot (talk | contribs) as of 00:18, 5 January 2020.
Jump to navigation Jump to search
See also: DAMP and Damp

English

Lua error in Module:interproject at line 62: Parameter "dab" is not used by this template.

Etymology

From Middle English damp (noun) and dampen (“to stifle; suffocate”). Akin to Low German damp, Dutch damp, and German Dampf (“vapor, steam, fog”), Icelandic dampi, Swedish damm (“dust”), and to German dampf imperative of dimpfen (“to smoke”). Also Middle English dampen (“to extinguish, choke, suffocate”). Ultimately all descend from Proto-Germanic *dampaz.

Pronunciation

  • enPR: dămp, IPA(key): /dæmp/
  • Audio (US):(file)
  • Rhymes: -æmp

Adjective

damp (comparative damper, superlative dampest)

  1. In a state between dry and wet; moderately wet; moist.
    • 25 January 2017, Leena Camadoo writing in the The Guardian, Dominican banana producers at sharp end of climate change
      Once the farms have been drained and the dead plants have been cut down and cleared, farmers then have to be alert for signs of black sigatoka, a devastating fungus which flourishes in damp conditions and can destroy banana farms.
    • 1697, John Dryden translating Virgil, Aeneid Book VI
      She said no more. The trembling Trojans hear,
      O'erspread with a damp sweat and holy fear.
    The lawn was still damp so we decided not to sit down.
    The paint is still damp, so please don't touch it.
  2. (figuratively) Despondent; dispirited, downcast.
    • 27 July 2016, Jane O’Faherty in The Irish Independent, Monarchs and prison officers win big on second race day
      Though Travis's 'Why does it always Rain on Me' boomed around the stands, there were few damp spirits in Galway on day two of the races.
    • 1667, John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book 1, ll. 522-3:
      All these and more came flocking; but with looks / Down cast and damp.
  3. Permitting the possession of alcoholic beverages, but not their sale.
    • 2002, Dana Stabenow, A Fine and Bitter Snow, →ISBN, page 32:
      The Roadhouse was twenty-seve miles down the road from Niniltna, nine feet and three inches outside the Niniltna Native Association's tribal jurisdiction, and therefore not subject to the dry law currently in effect. Or was it damp? Kate thought it might have changed, yet again, at the last election, from dry to damp, or maybe it was from wet to damp.

Usage notes

Damp commonly is used for disagreeable conditions and moist often is used for agreeable conditions:

  • damp clothes
  • moist cake
  • a damp compress (hot or cold)
  • a moist, sweaty brow

Synonyms

Derived terms

Translations

See also

Noun

damp (countable and uncountable, plural damps)

  1. Moisture; humidity; dampness.
    • c. 1602 William Shakespeare, All’s Well That Ends Well, Act II, Scene 1,[1]
      Ere twice in murk and occidental damp
      Moist Hesperus hath quench’d his sleepy lamp,
    • 1764, Elizabeth Griffith, Amana, London: W. Johnston, Act V, p. 49,[2]
      What means this chilling damp that clings around me!
      Why do I tremble thus!
    • 1848, Elizabeth Gaskell, Mary Barton, Chapter 10,[3]
      Unceasing, soaking rain was falling; the very lamps seemed obscured by the damp upon the glass, and their light reached but to a little distance from the posts.
    • 1928, Virginia Woolf, Orlando: A Biography, Penguin, 1942, Chapter 5, p. 160,[4]
      But what was worse, damp now began to make its way into every house—damp, which is the most insidious of all enemies, for while the sun can be shut out by blinds, and the frost roasted by a hot fire, damp steals in while we sleep; damp is silent, imperceptible, ubiquitous.
    • 2005, Kazuo Ishiguro, Never Let Me Go, London: Faber, 2010, Chapter 10, p. 115,[5]
      We sometimes kept our Wellingtons on the whole day, leaving trails of mud and damp through the rooms.
  2. (archaic) Fog; fogginess; vapor.
    • 1667, John Milton, “Book X”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC:
      Night […] with black air / Accompanied, with damps and dreadful gloom.
    • 1810, Percy Bysshe Shelley and Elizabeth Shelley, “Warrior” in Original Poetry by Victor and Cazire, London: John Lane, 1898, p. 57,[6]
      Her chilling finger on my head,
      With coldest touch congealed my soul—
      Cold as the finger of the dead,
      Or damps which round a tombstone roll—
    • 1887, Thomas Hardy, The Woodlanders, Chapter 40,[7]
      Summer was ending: in the daytime singing insects hung in every sunbeam; vegetation was heavy nightly with globes of dew; and after showers creeping damps and twilight chills came up from the hollows.
  3. (archaic) Dejection or depression; something that spoils a positive emotion (such as enjoyment, satisfaction, expectation or courage) or a desired activity.
    • 1713, Joseph Addison, Cato, A Tragedy, London: Jacob Tonson, Act III, Scene 1, p. 35,[8]
      Ev’n now, while thus I stand blest in thy Presence,
      A secret Damp of Grief comes o’er my Thoughts,
    • 1728, George Carleton (attributed to Daniel Defoe), The Memoirs of an English Officer, London: E. Symon, p. 72,[9]
      But though the War was proclaim’d, and Preparations accordingly made for it, the Expectations from all receiv’d a sudden Damp, by the as sudden Death of King William.
    • 1769, Edmund Burke, Observations on a Late State of the Nation, London: J. Dodsley, p. 33,[10]
      It is in this spirit that some have looked upon those accidents, that cast an occasional damp upon trade.
    • 1813, Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, Chapter 50,[11]
      No sentiment of shame gave a damp to her triumph.
    • 1850, Charles Dickens, David Copperfield, Chapter 10,[12]
      […] Mrs. Gummidge […] , I am sorry to relate, cast a damp upon the festive character of our departure, by immediately bursting into tears […]
    • 1866, James David Forbes, letter to A. Wills dated 2 January, 1866, in Life and Letters of James David Forbes, London: Macmaillan, 1873, p. 429,[13]
      […] I was concerned to hear from your brother that Mrs. Wills’ health had prevented her accompanying you to Sixt as usual. It must have thrown a damp over your autumn excursion […]
  4. (archaic or historical, mining) A gaseous product, formed in coal mines, old wells, pits, etc.
    • 1733, John Arbuthnot, An Essay Concerning the Effects of Air on Human Bodies, London: Jacob Tonson, Chapter 1, p. 19,[14]
      There are sulphurous Vapours which infect the Vegetables, and render the Grass unwholsom to the Cattle that feed upon it: Miners are often hurt by these Steams. Observations made in some of the Mines in Derbyshire, describe four sorts of those Damps.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

damp (third-person singular simple present damps, present participle damping, simple past and past participle damped)

  1. (transitive, archaic) To dampen; to render damp; to make humid, or moderately wet
    Synonym: moisten
    to damp cloth
  2. (transitive, archaic) To put out, as fire; to depress or deject; to deaden; to cloud; to check or restrain, as action or vigor; to make dull; to weaken; to discourage.
    • 1857, Charles Dickens, Little Dorrit Book 1 Chapter 34
      My Lords, that I am yet to be told that it behoves a Minister of this free country to set bounds to the philanthropy, to cramp the charity, to fetter the public spirit, to contract the enterprise, to damp the independent self-reliance of its people.
    • 1744, Mark Akenside, The Pleasures of the Imagination
      I do not mean to wake the gloomy form Of superstition dress'd in wisdom's garb, To damp your tender hopes
    • (Can we date this quote by Francis Bacon and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
      Usury dulls and damps all industries, improvements, and new inventions, wherein money would be stirring if it were not for this slug
    • (Can we date this quote by Sir John Lubbock and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
      How many a day has been damped and darkened by an angry word!
    • (Can we date this quote by Thomas Babington Macaulay and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
      The failure of his enterprise damped the spirit of the soldiers.
  3. (transitive) To suppress vibrations (mechanical) or oscillations (electrical) by converting energy to heat (or some other form of energy).
    • [15]
      Hollow rollers damp vibration.

Translations

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Anagrams

Danish

Danish Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia da

Etymology

From German Low German Damp (compare dampen, Dampen n)

Noun

damp c (singular definite dampen, plural indefinite dampe)

  1. steam

Inflection

Declension of damp
common
gender 		Singular Plural
indefinite definite indefinite definite
nominative damp dampen dampe dampene
genitive damps dampens dampes dampenes

Verb

damp

  1. (deprecated template usage) imperative of dampe

Dutch

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

From Middle Dutch damp.

Noun

damp m (plural dampen, diminutive dampje n)

  1. vapour (UK), vapor (US)
Derived terms

Etymology 2

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Verb

damp

  1. (deprecated template usage) first-person singular present indicative of dampen
  2. (deprecated template usage) imperative of dampen

Norwegian Bokmål

Norwegian Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia no

Etymology 1

From German Low German Damp (compare dampen, Dampen n)

Noun

damp m (definite singular dampen, indefinite plural damper, definite plural dampene)

  1. steam
  2. vapour (UK), vapor (US)
Derived terms
Terms derived from damp

Etymology 2

Verb

damp

  1. (deprecated template usage) imperative of dampe

References

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology

From German Low German Damp (compare dampen, Dampen n)

Noun

damp m (definite singular dampen, indefinite plural dampar, definite plural dampane)

  1. steam
  2. vapour (UK), vapor (US)

Derived terms

Terms derived from damp

References

Swedish

Verb

damp

  1. (deprecated template usage) past tense of dimpa.
Retrieved from "https://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=damp&oldid=58297246"