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evanescent

adj
/ɛvəˈnɛs(ə)nt/UK/ˌɛvəˈnɛsənt/US

Etymology

Borrowed from French évanescent (“evanescent”), from Latin ēvānēscēns (“disappearing, vanishing”), present participle of ēvānēscō (“to disappear, vanish; to die out, fade away; to lapse”), from ē- (variant of ex- (prefix meaning ‘away, out’)) + vānēscō (“to vanish”) (from vānus (“empty, vacant, void”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁weh₂- (“to abandon, leave”)) + -ēscō (suffix forming verbs with the sense ‘to become’)).

  1. derived from *h₁weh₂-✻ — “to abandon, leave”
  2. derived from ēvānēscēns — “disappearing, vanishing”
  3. borrowed from évanescent — “evanescent”

Definitions

  1. Disappearing, vanishing.

    • He cannot ſuppreſs his diſapprobation […] of thoſe evaneſcent echoes of ſchool philoſophy, faint-warbling through the grove of letters, to the injury of natural and ſcientific knowledge, and the annoyance of English literature.
    • The sea was each little bird's great playmate. […] In their airy flutterings, they seemed to rest on the evanescent spray.

  2. Barely there

    Barely there; almost imperceptible.

    • If the Fluids moving in an Evaneſcent Artery [i.e., a capillary] appear Globular, I ſuppose its becauſe the Canal is round, which alters the Caſe much.
    • Here are Sholes and Sholes, of various Characters, and of the moſt diverſified Sizes; from the gigantic Whale, whoſe flouncings "tempeſt the Ocean," to the evaneſcent Anchovy, whoſe Subſtance diſſolves in the ſmalleſt Fircaſſee.
    • Her face too was fresh in colour, but it was of a totally different quality—soft and evanescent, like the light under a heap of rose-petals.

  3. Ephemeral, fleeting, momentary.

    • It is to be obſerved, farther, that when we annihilate any thing in our Mind, we conſider it as ſomething evaneſcent, and removed out of Sight; […]
    • But alas! how momentary was the bliss!—the evaneſcent viſion ſoon fled, and the youthful queen [Mary, Queen of Scots] was arrayed in the melancholy garb of widowhood!

The neighborhood

Derived

evanescence, evanescently, multiple evanescent white dot syndrome, nonevanescent, unevanescent

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for evanescent. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA