English

Noun

nidor ‎(plural nidor)

1. The smell of burning animals, especially of burning animal fat.
   • 1743, Thomas Stackhouse, A Compleat Body of Speculative and Practical Divinity, edition 3 (London), page 524:

     The First-fruits were a common Oblation to their Deities; but the chief Part of their Worship consisted in sacrificiing Animals : And this they did out of a real Persuasion, that their Gods were pleased with their Blood, and were nourished with the Smoke, and Nidor of them; and therefore the more costly, they thought them the more acceptable, for which Reason, they stuck not sometimes to regale them with human Sacrifices.

   • 1896, Daniel Waterland, A Review of the Doctrine of the Eucharist, page 623:

     Elsewhere to blood, smoke, and nidor, he opposes purity of thought, sincerity of affection, […]

   • 1997, Thomas Pynchon, Mason & Dixon:

     The smell, at some times of year sensible for Miles, of Sheep, and wool-fat, and that queasy Nidor of Lambs baking in ovens meant for bread […]

2. (nonstandard) Any smell.
   • 2007, Samuel F. Pickering, Autumn spring, page 28:

     For her part Vicki smells little, not even the nidor of antifreeze at the stock car races at Lake Doucette.

   • 2008, Edgar Wallace, Devil Man, page 9:

     The long, yellow face was framed in side whiskers; there hung about him the nidor of stale cigar smoke.

Latin

Etymology

From Proto-Italic *knīdōs, from Proto-Indo-European *knīdos-. Cognate with Homeric Ancient Greek κνίση ‎(knísē, “smell of roasting fat”) and Attic κνῖσα ‎(knîsa), related to κνίζω ‎(knízō, “I pound, scratch, chop”) and κνίδη ‎(knídē, “nettle”) through an earlier dual sense of smelling and scratching.

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈniː.dor/, [ˈniː.dɔr]

Noun

nīdor m ‎(genitive nīdōris); third declension

1. the steam or smell from roasting, burning or boiling (especially animals)

Inflection

Third declension.

Descendants

• Italian: nidore
• Portuguese: nidor

References

• nidor in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• nidor in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• Félix Gaffiot (1934), “nidor”, in Dictionnaire Illustré Latin-Français, Paris: Hachette.