fumigate

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin fūmigō (“to smoke”), through the participial stem fūmigāt-,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} from fūmus (“smoke”),^[2][3][4][5] which is also the source of fume^[7][8] and comes from Proto-Indo-European *dheu- (“dust, vapor, smoke”).^[7] Etymonline instead takes it as a back-formation from fumigation, and Barnhart agrees, adding that Old French fumiger (“to smoke”) may have had some influence and that the Latin stem may be the direct source in some uses.^[7][9] The second part of the Latin verb is commonly linked to agō (“to drive, do”): Klein, Collins and the American Heritage Dictionary compound it directly,^[10][11][12] Barnhart proposes a lost adjective *fūmigus (“smoke-driving”),^[9] and Merriam-Webster and Dictionary.com speak of a verbal ending -igāre akin to it.^[5][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

To scent with fumes, to perfume: 1530, in Palsgrave's Lesclarcissement de la langue francoyse.^[2][9] Etymonline dates it to the 1520s,^[7] and notes that the older English verb for this was fume, from about 1400.^[7] The noun fumigation is older, recorded from about 1380 in Chaucer's House of Fame for generating smoke in a ceremony.^[9]

Semantic evolution

Perfuming came first, as with the noun, which moved from ceremonial smoke to treatment with aromatic fumes.^[9][8] Johnson (1755) defined the verb as to smoke or perfume by smoke or vapour, quoting Dryden's Virgil for "With fragrant thyme the city fumigate", and added the medical sense of healing by vapours,^[13] which the OED records in 1713.^[2] The OED also has one use from 1663 for extracting something in fumes.^[2] The modern idea of applying smoke or fumes, especially to cleanse or disinfect, is recorded only from 1781, in a letter of Cowper,^[2][7] and the older sense of perfuming is now archaic or rare.^[5][3]

Timeline

• 1530 – to scent with fumes, to perfume.^[2][9]
• 1663 – to extract in fumes (obsolete, rare).^[2]
• 1713 – to heal by vapours (obsolete).^[2]
• 1781 – to apply smoke or fumes, especially to disinfect.^[2][7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To treat a place or thing with smoke, vapour or gas in order to disinfect it or kill pests: They had the barn fumigated against rats.^{[5][12][11][2]}
2. To apply smoke, vapour or gas to something for any purpose.^[5][2]
3. To make a smell imperceptible in a room by filling it with aromatic fumes.^[5]
4. To darken oak by exposing it to fumes.^[2]
5. (archaic) To scent with incense or perfume.^[5][3][2]
6. (obsolete) To treat medically with vapours.^[13][2]

Word family

• fumigation
• fumigator

Related words

• fume
• perfume
• castigate

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
7. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
8. ^ a b Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
10. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
11. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
12. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
13. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.