• IPA: /kwɛnt͡ʃ/

quench (quenches, present participle quenching; past and past participle quenched)

1. (transitive) To satisfy, especially an actual or figurative thirst.

   The library quenched her thirst for knowledge.

   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Qveene. […], London: Printed [by John Wolfe] for VVilliam Ponsonbie, OCLC 960102938 ↗, book II, canto V, page 254 ↗:

     The wearie Traueiler, wandring that way, / Therein did often quench his thriſty heat, / And then by it his wearie limbes diſplay, / Whiles creeping ſlomber made him to forget{{...}

   • 1898, J. Meade Falkner, Moonfleet Chapter 4

     I began also to feel very hungry, as not having eaten for twenty-four hours; and worse than that, there was a parching thirst and dryness in my throat, and nothing with which to quench it.

   Synonyms: appease, slake
2. (transitive) To extinguish or put out (as a fire or light).

   Then the MacManus went down. The sudden quench of the white light was how I knew it. — Saul Bellowattention en

3. (transitive, metallurgy) To cool rapidly by dipping into a bath of coolant, as a blacksmith quenching hot iron.

   The swordsmith quenched the sword in an oil bath so that it wouldn't shatter.

4. (transitive, chemistry) To terminate or greatly diminish (a chemical reaction) by destroying or deforming the remaining reagents.
5. (transitive, physics) To rapidly change the parameters of a physical system.

• French: apaiser, étancher, rassasier
• German: stillen
• Italian: abbeverare, estinguere, appagare
• Portuguese: saciar/matar a sede
• Russian: утоля́ть
• Spanish: saciar, matar la sed

• French: éteindre
• German: löschen
• Italian: estinguere
• Portuguese: apagar
• Russian: туши́ть
• Spanish: apagar

• French: tremper
• German: abkühlen
• Italian: temperare
• Portuguese: resfriar, temperar
• Russian: (бы́стро) охлажда́ть
• Spanish: templar

quench (plural quenches)

1. (physics) The abnormal termination of operation of a superconducting magnet, occurring when part of the superconducting coil enters the normal (resistive) state.
2. (physics) A rapid change of the parameters of a physical system.