odour, odor
(ˈəʊdə(r))
Forms: 3–4 odur, 4– odour, 4, 6– odor, (4 odere, -yre, 4– 5 odir, -e, 5 odure, hodure, 5–6 odoure, -owr(e, -eur).
[a. AF. odour, OF. odor, odur, ad. L. odōr-em smell, scent. The spelling odor, occasional in ME., become obs. in 14th c., but arose again in 16th c. after L., was frequent in 17th c., and is now usual in U.S.]
1. That property of a substance that is perceptible by the sense of smell; scent, smell; sometimes spec. sweet or pleasing scent; fragrance.
| a 1300 Land of Cokaygne 76 in E.E.P. (1862) 158 Trie maces beþ þe flure, þe rind, canel of swet odur. a 1300 Cursor M. 3701 Þe odor [v.r. odour] o þi uestement It smelles als o piement. c 1375 Sc. Leg. Saints xvi. (Magdalena) 114 Al þe place Fulfillyt of þat odyre was. 1422 tr. Secreta Secret., Priv. Priv. 208 By the noos-thurles we haue knowlech of odeurs and stynches. Ibid. 247 In wyntyr the hodure of hote thynges;..In somer odure of colde thynges. 1514 Barclay Cyt. & Uplondyshm. (Percy Soc.) p. xlii, To see suche dishes & smell the swete odour And nothing to taste is utter displeasour. 1646 Sir T. Browne Pseud. Ep. ii. ii. (1686) 50 The effluvium or odor of Steel. 1664 Butler Hud. ii. i. 574 All Spices, Perfumes, and Sweet Powders Shall borrow from your breath their Odours. 1697 Dryden Virg. Georg. iii. 628 Fume with stinking Galbanum thy Stalls: With that rank Odour from thy Dwelling-place To drive the Viper's Brood. 1784 Cowper Task i. 317 The lime at dewy eve Diffusing odours. 1835 Willis Pencillings I. ii. 18 A more nauseating odour I never inhaled. 1873 Black Pr. Thule (1874) 45 There is an odour of sweet brier about, hovering in the warm, still air. |
2. transf. A substance that emits a sweet smell or scent; a perfume;
esp. incense, spice, ointment, etc.; also, an odoriferous flower.
arch. or
Obs.| 1388 Wyclif Rev. v. 8 The foure and twenti eldre men..hadden ech of hem harpis, and goldun violis ful of odours. 1503 Dunbar Thistle & Rose 6 Quhen..lusty May..Had maid the birdis to begyn thair houris Amang the tendir odouris reid and quhyt. 1526 Tindale Luke i. 9 His lott was to bren odoures [R.V. incense]. 1534 ― John xix. 40 Then toke they the body of Iesu and wounde it in lynnen clothes with the odoures [1611 spices]. 1629 Maxwell tr. Herodian (1635) 227 They throw in (by heapes) all Sorts of Spices, and Sweet Odours. 1697 Dryden Virg. Georg. iv. 601 With Nectar she her Son anoints..Down from his Head the liquid Odours ran. 1709 Prior Song, ‘If wine and music’, Thy Myrtles strow, thy Odours burn. 1871 R. Ellis Catullus lxiv. 87 A royal virgin, in odours silkily nestled. |
† 3. The sense of smell.
Obs. rare.
| 1398 Trevisa Barth. De P.R. xv. lxxiii. (MS. Bodl.) lf. 156 b/1 Men wiþoute mouþe, and þei..lyueþ onliche bi odoure and smell of noseþrelles. 1432–50 tr. Higden (Rolls) I. 291 Turfes..whiche be more vile than woode..and more tedious to the odoure. |
4. fig. a. ‘Fragrance’; ‘savour’.
| a 1340 Hampole Psalter cxxxiv. 18 Þei can not see the riȝt way, and þei fele not þe gode odor of crist. 1382 Wyclif 2 Cor. ii. 14 Therfor thankingis to God, that..schewith by vs the odour of his knowynge [1582 (Rhem.) the odour of his knowledge]. ― Eph. v. 2 Crist..ȝaf him silf for vs an offryng and sacrifice to God, in to the odour of swetnesse. 1526 Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W. 1531) 59 b, Let the swete odour of deuocyon and prayer spyre out and ascende vp to thy lorde. 1605 B. Jonson Volpone iv. i, I had thought the odour, sir, of your good name Had been more precious to you. 1791 Boswell Johnson i, The political principles in which he was educated, and of which he ever retained some odour. 1873 Burton Hist. Scot. VI. lxv. 12 No odour of religious intolerance attaches to it. |
b. (
good or
bad) Repute, favour, estimation.Also without qualifying
adj.| 1835 Dickens Let. 16 Dec. (1965) I. 106 As the Tories are the principal party here, I am in no very good odour in the town. 1847 Illustr. Lond. News 24 July 62/1 To day he was in better odour. 1864 D. G. Mitchell Wet Days at Edgewood 166 Hartlib was in good odor during the days of the commonwealth. 1886 Spurgeon Treas. Dav. Ps. cxlii. 4 When a person is in ill odour it is quite wonderful how weak the memories of his former friends become. 1954 N. Mitford Mme de Pompadour xviii. 230 In 1760 St. Germain fell into bad odour with the police and Choiseul sent him packing. 1977 Bulletin (Sydney) 22 Jan. 33/1 There is no doubt that the Daoud affair, which has brought France into such odour abroad including a call for the boycott of French goods in the United States, was the result of conflicting interests between French diplomats and French security services. |
5. odour of sanctity (F.
odeur de sainteté, 17th c. in Littré): a sweet or balsamic odour stated to have been exhaled by the bodies of eminent saints at their death, or on subsequent disinterment, and held to attest their saintship; hence,
fig., gracious manifestation of saintliness; good repute as a saint, reputation for holiness: sometimes used ironically or sarcastically.
(For statements of the reputed fact, or references to it, see Engelgrave
Cæleste Pantheon (1727) I. 110;
Selecta Martyrum Acta (Gaume, Paris) IV. 111, 198–9;
Fioretti di S. Francesco (1546) xlviii. 66 b; Pellisson
Lett. Hist. I. 131; J. De La Barre
Contin. Bossuet's
Hist. Univers. (1771) II. 270; Voltaire
La Pucelle (1780) i. 22; Bæda
Hist. Eccles. iii. viii;
St. Guthlac (Cod. Exon.) 1272, 1318; William of Malmesb.
Gesta Reg. I. ii. §216 (
tr. Bohn ii. xiii. 244); Malory
Arthur xxi. xii; Freeman
Norm. Conq. III. xi. 32; also
quots. 1749 in
odoriferous,
odorous.)
| 1756 A. Butler Lives Saints 24 Apl. II. 169 She [St. Bona] died in 673, leaving behind her a sweet odour of her sanctity and virtues to all France. 1778–84 Cookworthy tr. Swedenborg's Heaven & Hell §449 There was also a sensation of aromatic odour, as of a dead body embalmed, for when the celestial angels are present, what is cadaverous then excites a sensation as of what is aromatic. (Note by T. Hartley 1778. This may serve to explain what..[is] related by authors of good credit, concerning certain persons of eminent piety, who are said to have died in the odour of sanctity from the fragrancy that issued from their bodies after death.) 1819 Scott Ivanhoe iv, My respected grandmother, Hilda of Middleham, who died in odour of sanctity, little short..of her glorious namesake, the blessed Saint Hilda of Whitby. 1829 Southey Pilgr. Compostella Poet. Wks. VII. 264 These blessed Fowls, at seven years end, In the odour of sanctity died. 1833 Raine Brief. Acct. Durham Cath. 64 Saints sleeping in all the odour of incorruptibility. 1856 R. A. Vaughan Mystics (1860) I. 90 There is an odour of iniquity, you must know, as well as an odour of sanctity. |
6. Comb., as
odour-current,
odour-reek,
odour-wind;
odour-breathing,
odour-faded,
odour-free,
odour-laden,
odour-like,
odour-proof adjs.;
odour-blindness, an inability to perceive a particular smell or range of smells.
| 1931 Eugenical News July 106/1 Some were thus ‘blind’ to fragrance in the red flowers though perceiving fragrance in the pink while others were just reversed in their odor ‘blindness’. 1973 Nature 23 Mar. 271/2 Three types of odour-blindness or specific anosmia have been studied. |
| 1821 Shelley Prometh. Unb. ii. i, The odour⁓breathing sleep Of faint night flowers. |
| 1876 Lanier Poems, Psalm of the West 182 What wavering way the odor-current sets. |
| 1821 Shelley Prometh. Unb. iii. iii, It feeds the quick growth of..odour-faded blooms. |
| 1955 Jrnl. Appl. Physiol. VIII. 341/2 The odorant..introduced through an ultramicroburette was vaporized into the odor-free test room by an atomizing jet of odor-free air. 1962 W. D. Hislop in H. W. Chatfield Sci. Surface Coatings xviii. 531 Use can be made of catalytic oxidation to treat the exhaust and render it odour-free. |
| 1885 W. B. Yeats in Dublin Univ. Rev. Apr. 58/1 Dreaming in their soft odour-laden sleep. 1900 ― Shadowy Waters 44 Where time is drowned in odour-laden winds. |
| 1626 Bacon Sylva §904 Under this head, you may place all Imbibitions of Aire, where the substance is materiall, Odour-like. |
| 1934 Webster, Odorproof. 1950 Amer. Jrnl. Psychol. LXIII. 433 The need for rigorous experimental controls for smell soon became apparent. A large odor-proof globe..was first thought of. 1951 M. McLuhan Mech. Bride (1967) 62/1 A special caste of robots, who would care for the victims of such necessities in germ- and odor-proof laboratories. 1960 Farmer & Stockbreeder 1 Mar. 55/3 The odour-proof film minimizes the risk of contamination. |
| 1932 W. Faulkner Light in August viii. 187 The odorreek of all anonymous men. |
Hence (
nonce-wds.)
ˈodouret, a faint smell;
ˈodourful a. = odorous.
| 1825 L. Hunt Redi Bacchus in Tuscany 573 He makes odourets. 1889 Chicago Advance 30 May, More lasting, precious, odorful, than all The flowers of polar or of tropic seas. |