• (British) IPA: /fjuːm/

fume (plural fumes)

1. A gas or vapour/vapor that is strong-smelling or dangerous to inhale.

   Don't stand around in there breathing the fumes while the adhesive cures.

   • the fumes of new shorn hay

2. A material that has been vaporized from the solid or liquid state to the gas state and re-coalesced to the solid state.

   Lead fume is a greyish powder, mainly comprising lead sulfate.

3. Rage or excitement which deprives the mind of self-control.

   the fumes of passion

4. Anything unsubstantial or airy; idle conceit; vain imagination.
   • 1623, Francis Bacon, A Discourse of a War with Spain

     a show of fumes and fancies

5. The incense of praise; inordinate flattery.
   • 1638, Robert Burton (scholar), The Anatomy of Melancholy

     to smother him with fumes and eulogies

6. (obsolete) A passionate person.

• German: Rauch, Qualm
• Italian: fumo
• Portuguese: vapor
• Russian: испарение
• Spanish: humo

fume (fumes, present participle fuming; past and past participle fumed)

1. (transitive) To expose (something) to fumes; specifically, to expose wood, etc., to ammonia in order to produce dark tint#Noun|tints.
2. (transitive) To apply or offer incense#Noun|incense to.
3. (intransitive) To emit fumes.
   • 1667, John Milton, “Book 10”, in Paradise Lost. A Poem Written in Ten Books, London: Printed [by Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […] [a]nd by Robert Boulter […] [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], OCLC 228722708 ↗; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: The Text Exactly Reproduced from the First Edition of 1667: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, OCLC 230729554 ↗:

     where the golden altar fumed

   • Silenus lay, / Whose constant cups lay fuming to his brain.

4. (intransitive) To pass off in fumes or vapours.

   • Their parts are kept from fuming away by their fixity.

5. (intransitive, figuratively) To express#Verb|express or feel great anger#Noun|anger.

   He’s still fuming about the argument they had yesterday.

   • He frets, he fumes, he stares, he stamps the ground.

   • 1808 February 21, Walter Scott, “(please specify the introduction or canto number, or chapter name)”, in Marmion; a Tale of Flodden Field, Edinburgh: Printed by J[ames] Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Company, […]; London: William Miller, and John Murray, OCLC 270129616 ↗:

     Her mother did fret, and her father did fume.

6. (intransitive, figuratively) To be as in a mist#Noun|mist; to be dull#Verb|dulled and stupefied.
   • c. 1606–1607, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Anthonie and Cleopatra”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358 ↗, [Act II, scene i]:

     Keep his brain fuming.

• German: rauchen, qualmen
• Portuguese: fumegar
• Spanish: humear

• French: fulminer
• German: schäumen
• Italian: rodersi il fegato, mangiarsi il fegato
• Portuguese: fumegar
• Spanish: echar humo (colloquial)