intumescence means the process of swelling up or the condition of being swollen. It carries an Arena rating of 1479, earned across 12 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, intumescence ranks #20 of 13,225 for Most Ponderous Words, #309 of 13,225 for Most Satisfying to Say, #1,374 of 13,225 for Most Sublime Words, #1,400 of 13,225 for Most Vivid Words.
Why “intumescence” is a great word
The process of swelling up or the condition of being swollen. From French intumescence (17th century), from Latin intumescere ("to swell up"), from in- ("in, into") + tumescere ("to begin to swell"), from tumēre ("to be swollen"). First attested in English in the 1650s. Unlike "edema," which denotes a specific pathology of fluid, or "protuberance," which names a bulging shape, intumescence is the broader, more primal state of becoming enlarged. It is the rising dough under a cloth, the taut skin around a bee sting, and the ominous, gathering cloud before a storm—a silent, physical tension that is the body of the world holding its breath.
Etymology
See intumescent.
noun
- The process of swelling up or the condition of being swollen.
- An instance of such swelling.“...but there are other causes of change, which, though slow in their operation, and invisible in their progress, are perhaps as much superior to human resistance, as the revolutions of the sky, or intumescence of the tide.”
Words closest in meaning
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