Word of the Day Archive
Wednesday July 16, 2008
mephitic \muh-FIT-ik\ , adjective:
1. Offensive to the smell; as, mephitic odors.
2. Poisonous; noxious.
The mephitic stench from the bilge became overpowering.
-- Richard Holmes, Coleridge: Darker Reflections, 1804-1834
Over everything presides "a sort of mephitic fog," a pervasive sulfuric stink.
-- Dale Peck, "Way Outback", New York Times, March 22, 1998
. . .unpoisoned by the mephitic vapours which poisoned the atmosphere of his police-office.
-- Henry Fielding, Tom Jones
Mephitic is the adjective form of mephitis, "a foul-smelling or noxious exhalation from the earth; a stench from any source," from the Latin.
Dictionary.com Entry and Pronunciation for mephitic
