vapour

English

Alternative forms

• vapor (US)

Etymology

From Middle English vapour, from Anglo-Norman vapour, Old French vapor, from Latin vapor (“steam, heat”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈveɪpə/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈveɪpɚ/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Noun

vapour (countable and uncountable, plural vapours)

1. Cloudy diffused matter such as mist, steam or fumes suspended in the air.
   • 1892, James Yoxall, chapter 5, in The Lonely Pyramid:

     The desert storm was riding in its strength; the travellers lay beneath the mastery of the fell simoom. […] Drifts of yellow vapour, fiery, parching, stinging, filled the air.

2. The gaseous state of a substance that is normally a solid or liquid.
3. (obsolete) Wind; flatulence.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Francis Bacon to this entry?)

4. Something unsubstantial, fleeting, or transitory; unreal fancy; vain imagination; idle talk; boasting.
   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], OCLC 964384981, James 4:14:

     For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.

5. (archaic, in the plural) Hypochondria; melancholy; the blues; hysteria, or other nervous disorder.
   • Jan 13, 1732, John Arbuthnot, letter to Jonathan Swift

     He talks me into a fit of vapours twice or thrice a week

6. (dated) Any medicinal agent designed for administration in the form of inhaled vapour.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Brit. Pharm to this entry?)

Derived terms

• vapour pressure
• vapour trail
• water vapour

Translations

steam — see steam

vapor — see vapor

See also

• dew point

Verb

vapour (third-person singular simple present vapours, present participle vapouring, simple past and past participle vapoured)

1. (intransitive) To become vapour; to be emitted or circulated as vapour.
2. (transitive) To turn into vapour.

   to vapour away a heated fluid

   • 1617, Ben Jonson, Lovers Made Men

     He'd […] laugh to see one throw his heart away, / Another, sighing, vapour forth his soul.

3. (intransitive) To use insubstantial language; to boast or bluster.
   • 1888, Rudyard Kipling, ‘The Bisara of Pooree’, Plain Tales from the Hills, Folio Society 2005, p. 172:

     He vapoured, and fretted, and fumed, and trotted up and down, and tried to make himself pleasing in Miss Hollis's big, quiet, grey eyes, and failed.

   • 1904, “Saki”, ‘Reginald's Christmas Revel’, Reginald:

     then the Major gave us a graphic account of a struggle he had with a wounded bear. I privately wished that the bears would win sometimes on these occasions; at least they wouldn't go vapouring about it afterwards.

   • 1978, Lawrence Durrell, Livia, Faber & Faber 1992 (Avignon Quintet), p. 513:

     He felt he would start vapouring with devotion if this went on, so he bruptly took his leave with a cold expression on his face which dismayed her for she thought that it was due to distain for her artistic opinions.

4. To emit vapour or fumes.
   • 1626, Francis Bacon, Sylva Sylvarum, Or, A Naturall Historie: In Ten Centuries

     Running waters vapour not so much as standing waters.

5. (transitive) To give (someone) the vapours; to depress, to bore.
   • 1782, Frances Burney, Cecilia, III.vi.9:

     “I only mean,” cried she, giddily, “that he might have some place a little more pleasant to live in, for really that old moat and draw-bridge are enough to vapour him to death […].”

Translations

intransitive: to become vapour; to be emitted or circulated as vapour

• Japanese: 蒸発する (ja) (じょうはつする, jōhatsu suru), 揮発する (ja) (きはつする, kihatsu suru), 気化する (ja) (きかする, kika suru)

• Russian: испаря́ться (ru) impf (isparjátʹsja), испари́ться (ru) pf (isparítʹsja)

transitive: to turn into vapour

• Japanese: 蒸発させる (ja) (じょうはつさせる, jōhatsu saseru), 揮発させる (ja) (きはつさせる, kihatsu saseru), 気化させる (ja) (きかさせる, kika saseru)

• Russian: испаря́ть (ru) impf (isparjátʹ), испари́ть (ru) pf (isparítʹ)

intransitive: to use insubstantial language; to boast or bluster

• Japanese: 管を巻く (くだをまく, kuda o maku), 粋がる (ja) (いきがる, ikigaru), 威張り散らす (いばりちらす, ibarichirasu)

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Middle English

Etymology 1

Borrowed from Anglo-Norman vapour, from Latin vapor.

Alternative forms

• vapor, wapour, vapoure, vapur

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /vaːˈpuːr/, /vaˈpuːr/, /ˈvaːpur/

Noun

vapour (plural vapours)

1. Fumes or vapour; a visible gaseous emission:
   1. A visible vapour; steam
   2. The vapour of water; mist.
   3. Fumes given off by combustion; smoke.
2. Heated air; air of a high temperature.
3. (physiology) A noxious bodily fume believed to be the cause of maladies.
4. (rare) A airborne smell; a nasal sensation transmitted via the air.
5. (rare) Effect, emanation.

Related terms

• vapouren

Descendants

• English: vapour, vapor
• Scots: vapour

References

• “vā̆pǒur (n.)” in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-09-01.

Etymology 2

From Old French vaporer.

Verb

vapour

1. Alternative form of vapouren