Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Easily ignited and capable of burning rapidly; flammable. See Usage Note at flammable.
- adj. Quickly or easily aroused to strong emotion; excitable.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Capable of being set on fire; susceptible of combustion; easily fired.
- Easily excited or inflamed; highly excitable.
Wiktionary
- adj. Capable of burning; easily set on fire.
- adj. figuratively Easily excited; set off by the slightest excuse; easily enraged or inflamed.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Capable of being easily set fire; easily enkindled; combustible.
- adj. Excitable; irritable; irascible; easily provoked.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. easily ignited
Etymologies
- From Latin as if *inflammabilis, from inflammare ("to set on fire"), from in ("in, on") + flamma ("flame"). (Wiktionary)
- Middle English, liable to inflammation, from Medieval Latin īnflammābilis, from Latin īnflammāre, to inflame; see inflame. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Robert Boyle had before 1671 dissolved iron in dilute hydrochloric acid and prepared what he described as the inflammable solution of Mars [Iron].”
“Up until about 30 years ago flammable substances were often described as inflammable (as in the word 'inflame') but this was dangerous as sometimes people thought that inflammable meant”
“But the fact is that the generation of these windy flames, or fiery winds as they may be called, arises from a conflict of two bodies of exactly opposite natures; the one being highly inflammable, which is the nature of sulphur, the other abhorring flame, as the crude spirit in niter.”
“Ralph Touchett had praised his cousin for being morally inflammable, that is for being quick to take a hint that was meant as good advice.”
“Cavendish, made in 1766, that hydrogen gas, called inflammable air, is at least seven times lighter than atmospheric air.”
“Mr. Cavendish has shewn that the gas called inflammable air, is at least ten times lighter than common air;”
The Botanic Garden A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: the Economy of Vegetation
“I'm also nonplussed by "inflammable" and "flammable" which mean the same thing but look like they mean the opposite.”
“I believe he points out elsewhere in the book that airlines are the very same people who believe us too witless to understand "inflammable".”
“It was then, and is now, a place where the houses stood very thick and close together: all round were warehouses filled with oil, wine, tar, and every kind of inflammable stuff.”
“Aviation experts suspect Stack may have carried some kind of inflammable liquid in the plane, since the intensity of the explosion is inconsistent with the small amount of fuel such a plane could carry in its tank.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘inflammable’.
-
SCIE - EU nomenclature
All the scientific words found in the official EU nomenclature. For the screening I used Vocabgrabber of the Visual Thesaurus.
silicon, silica, shrimp, shelve, shallot, serine, seedling, septic, secretin, seaweed, screening, Scomber and 1171 more...
-
IMCO - EU nomenclature
includes words of the "Prodcom list"
abaca, abdominal, abrasive, absorbent, absorber, accelerator, accessory, account book, accumulator, acebutolol, acetaldehyde, acetamide and 4515 more...
-
The Bucolic Abattoir
Words which, when spoken, suggest something other than their real meaning.
bucolic, fungible, brouhaha, narthex, restive, inflammable, invaluable, raze, pulchritude, noisome, fatuous, terrific and 21 more...
-
Deceptively named words
Words that mean the opposite of what they sound like they mean
pulchritude, enervate, restive, puissant, redoubtable, spendthrift, quean, matriculate, tripping, gainsay, nonplus, prosaic and 12 more...
-
See Usage Note at
Being a list of words with the phrase "See Usage Note at" in their definitions. Most of these come from the American Heritage Dictionary.
upon, seldom, among, compliment, thus, further, predicament, latter, repel, inflammable, gentleman, adage and 12 more...
-
big book gre
abase, abbess, abbey, abbot, abdicate, abdomen, abdominal, abduction, abed, aberration, abet, abeyance and 6691 more...
-
gre2
aberrant, aberration, aboveboard, abrasive, abstemious, acme, admonish, affable, affluent, alacrity, allegory, alleviate and 1901 more...
-
magoosh1
aberration, aboveboard, abysmal, ace, affable, aghast, alacrity, ambiguous, ambivalent, ameliorate, amenable, amiable and 222 more...
-
Autantonyms
Words with mutually exclusive double meanings. Also, here are some:
QUASI-AUTANTONYMS: slow up/slow down; bar/debar; bone/debone; burn up/burn down; fat chance/slim chance; fill in/fil...clip, cleave, sanction, handicap, fast, jibe, secrete, aloha, bimonthly, bolt, cheerio, commencement and 139 more...
-
lavendargrrl's Words
surfeit, radiant, sussuration, sustenance, authenticity, aching, solitude, solicitous, limerance, compersion, philanthropy, mystery and 108 more...
-
My Revised GRE Preparation List
Words from the new GRE : This list consists mostly of words from the book Magoosh-GRE-vocab-ebook, which is one of the best vocab materials available, especially if you have started preparing one ...
alacrity, prosaic, veracity, paucity, contrite, trite, maintain, laconic, pugnacious, disparate, egregious, innocuous and 533 more...
-
lanklenmot's Words
ineluctable, prelapsarian, bien pensant, prospero, preternatural, gratifying, iconoclast, cineast, persnickety, tumescent, galvanize, pap and 887 more...
-
Papageno's Words, Pt. I
hobbledehoy, absquatulate, chthonic, prolix, ululate, internecine, verisimilitude, animadversion, concupiscence, vertiginous, cucullate, lucubrate and 1554 more...
-
Magoosh
menace, injunction, juggernaut, refrain, mnemonic, abysmal, grueling, ace, gregarious, amiable, wacky, esoteric and 201 more...
-
Antagonyms
Words that are their own antonyms
cleave, bolt, apology, custom, aught, inflammable, sanction, prize
-
List 003
ephemeral, paramount, deviation, swathe, perfidy, elusive, aptitude, imprudent, potpourri, posthumous, fidelity, devout and 19 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for inflammable.
laiane I think I read (a long, long time ago) in The Elements of Style that "flammable" was a word created for the safety of idiots and small children. His words, not mine. Dec 1, 2007
cathari I like to call flame-retardant items "ininflammable". ;) Oct 30, 2007
slumry Flammable and inflmmable both mean combustible. Although "inflammable" is the older, and some say the preferred, word (derived from "inflame,") "flammable" was adopted as the preferred word of caution on trucks, etc. because people began to think that something that was "in-flammable" must be "in-combustible!"
Now isn't that funny? Jun 17, 2007