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Smell   /smɛl/   Listen
Smell

noun
1.
The sensation that results when olfactory receptors in the nose are stimulated by particular chemicals in gaseous form.  Synonyms: odor, odour, olfactory perception, olfactory sensation.
2.
Any property detected by the olfactory system.  Synonyms: aroma, odor, odour, olfactory property, scent.
3.
The general atmosphere of a place or situation and the effect that it has on people.  Synonyms: feel, feeling, flavor, flavour, look, spirit, tone.  "A clergyman improved the tone of the meeting" , "It had the smell of treason"
4.
The faculty that enables us to distinguish scents.  Synonyms: olfaction, olfactory modality, sense of smell.
5.
The act of perceiving the odor of something.  Synonym: smelling.
verb
(past & past part. smelt or smelled; pres. part. smelling)
1.
Inhale the odor of; perceive by the olfactory sense.
2.
Emit an odor.
3.
Smell bad.
4.
Have an element suggestive (of something).  Synonyms: reek, smack.  "This passage smells of plagiarism"
5.
Become aware of not through the senses but instinctively.  Synonyms: sense, smell out.  "I smell trouble" , "Smell out corruption"



Related searches:
smell out
smell up
sense of smell
smelling
smelly


WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University


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"Smell" Quotes from Famous Books



... wind.... In the meanwhile nobody went home; on the contrary hundreds of newcomers filtered in, filling the great room solid with stern-faced soldiers and workmen who stood for hours and hours, indefatigably intent. The air was thick with cigarette smoke, and human breathing, and the smell of coarse clothes ...
— Ten Days That Shook the World • John Reed
... whole of the day begging in the streets and dodging the guard, and even so I only collected four sous. I could have got more perhaps, only that at about midday the smell of food from an eating- house turned me sick and faint, and when I regained consciousness I found myself huddled up under a doorway and evening gathering in fast around me. If Mme. la Marquise could go two days without food I ought to go four. I struggled to my feet; fortunately I ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... for a moment I seemed to feel the smell of lilac. Dick was once—nice to me under a lilac. Oh, Mr. Don—' She goes to him like a child, and he soothes ...
— Echoes of the War • J. M. Barrie
... tell you that in the last few weeks before he left you your dad grew old. He's grown old before, but never as old as that. The other times, the mere sight and smell of Africa started his blood again. But this time he stayed ...
— Through stained glass • George Agnew Chamberlain
... Rousseau; or powdered courtiers, uttering epigrams against kings and religions,—straws that foretold the whirlwind. Paul Courier was right! Frenchmen are Frenchmen still; they are full of fine phrases, and their thoughts smell of the theatre; they mistake foil for diamonds, the Grotesque for the Natural, the Exaggerated for the Sublime: but still I say, Paul Courier was right,—there is more honesty now in a single salon in Paris ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton


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