Pronounced: puh-LIH-juh-nee, noun
Notes: You may know this word
Yesterday’s word
The word deliquesce means
- to dissolve or melt away
- to become soft or liquid with age or maturity (used of some fungal structures)
First usage
Our word came into English in the mid-1700s
Background / Comments
Our word came from de- (from; down; away) and the Latin word liquēre (to be fluid). The first definition may be used in a figurative manner (such as “I’m afraid I will deliquesce in this heat”). It’s a nice long word to know and drop into conversations instead of “dissolve” or “melt away”. The second sense is more commonly used in science for something that absorbs moisture from the air until it dissolves in that absorbed water. Plants and fungi can deliquesce, and as they do, they lose rigidity.
Richard's Vocabulary Word-of-the-Day 