smoke

If those were the days, however, when steam was triumphant, they were also the days of smoke. Nowhere was this so apparent as at "Kings Cross (Suburban)" where, one after another, the Great Northern tank engines thumped their way up the incline and emerged from the tunnel, in clouds of steam and smoke, to pound their way up the last few hundred feet of gradient alongside the platform.

1952 October, C. A. Johns, “One Hundred Years at Kings Cross—1”, in Railway Magazine, page 657:

Since the mid-1980s, when Indonesia first began to clear its bountiful forests on an industrial scale in favour of lucrative palm-oil plantations, “haze” has become an almost annual occurrence in South-East Asia. The cheapest way to clear logged woodland is to burn it, producing an acrid cloud of foul white smoke that, carried by the wind, can cover hundreds, or even thousands, of square miles.

2013 June 29, “Unspontaneous combustion”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8842, page 29:

(uncountable) The visible vapor/vapour, gases, and fine particles given off by burning or smoldering material.

2019, Idles, "Never Fight a Man With a Perm", Joy as an Act of Resistance.
I said I've got a penchant for smokes and kicking douches in the mouth / Sadly for you my last cigarette's gone out

Can I bum a smoke off you?; I need to go buy some smokes.

Hey, you got some smoke?

ERCS Guard: Got a smoke? We're all out.

2008, BioWare, Mass Effect (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →ISBN, →OCLC, PC, scene: Noveria:

(colloquial, uncountable) Anything to smoke (e.g. cigarettes, marijuana, etc.)

I lit a pipe and had a good long smoke, and went on watching.

1884 December 10, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter VII, in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: (Tom Sawyer’s Comrade) […], London: Chatto & Windus, […], →OCLC:

I'm going out for a smoke.

(colloquial, countable, never plural) An instance of smoking a cigarette, cigar, etc.; the duration of this act.

The excitement behind the new candidate proved to be smoke.

I fed her a lot of smoke about a sheep station outside Adelaide and a big property in the high street with a glass front and ‘Thomas’ in lights. She didn’t believe me.

1974, John le Carré, chapter 6, in Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, New York: Knopf, page 44:

(uncountable, figuratively) A fleeting illusion; something insubstantial, evanescent, unreal, transitory, or without result.

The smoke of controversy.

(uncountable, figuratively) Something used to obscure or conceal; an obscuring condition; see also smoke and mirrors.

smoke:

(uncountable) A light grey colour/color tinted with blue.

You better not be giving me no smoke.

(uncountable, slang) Bother; problems; hassle.

(military, uncountable) A particulate of solid or liquid particles dispersed into the air on the battlefield to degrade enemy ground or for aerial observation. Smoke has many uses--screening smoke, signaling smoke, smoke curtain, smoke haze, and smoke deception. Thus it is an artificial aerosol.

Should the commander of one column desire to communicate with the other, he raises three smokes simultaneously, which, if seen by the other party, should be responded to in the same manner.

1860, Randolph Barnes Marcy, The Prairie and Overland Traveller, page 203:

[…] and we could not discern any settlement or any people, but we did see two smokes up-river in some thick groves of oak and cork and willows and other high trees, of a good thickness, resembling ash trees.

1923, California Historical Society Quarterly, volume 2, page 152:

In the evening haze, even the Calton Gaol took on something of the savage grandeur of a Doré drawing, and this was by no means spoilt by the rising smokes of North British engines in the ravine below.

1941 January, C. Hamilton Ellis, “The Scottish Station”, in Railway Magazine, page 1:

During the night, a severe lightning storm passed over this area and in the morning the towerman reported two smokes separated by about two miles distance.

1957, Sylva: The Lands and Forests Review, volumes 13-14, page 43:

The aerial reconnaissance did see active flame on heavy fuels (logs) and fine fuels (duff/understory), and several smokes.

2021 May 15, “Guadalupe Mountains National Park Temporarily Closes Backcountry Campsites due to Dog Fire”, in Guadalupe Mountains National Park News Releases:

(countable) A distinct column of smoke, such as indicating a burning area or fire.

en-noun

smoke (countable and uncountable, plural smokes)

anta intai

visible particles and vapour given off by burning material

From Middle English smoke, from Old English smoca (“smoke”), probably a derivative of the verb (see below). Related to Dutch smook (“smoke”), Middle Low German smôk (“smoke”), dialectal German Schmauch (“smoke”).


smoke

He's smoking his pipe.
Smoking a pipe has gone out of fashion.
Olivia's dad smoked various brands when he was younger.

(transitive) To inhale and exhale the smoke from a burning cigarette, cigar, pipe, etc.

He used to drop into my chambers once in a while to smoke, and was first-rate company. When I gave a dinner there was generally a cover laid for him. I liked the man for his own sake, and even had he promised to turn out a celebrity it would have had no weight with me.

1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter I, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC, page 2:

To Edward […] he was terrible, nerve-inflaming, poisonously asphyxiating. He sat rocking himself in the late Mr. Churchill's swing chair, smoking and twaddling.

1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:

Do you smoke?

(intransitive) To inhale and exhale tobacco smoke.

My old truck was still smoking even after the repairs.

Hard by a cottage chimney smokes.

(intransitive) Of a fire in a fireplace: to emit smoke outward instead of up the chimney, owing to imperfect draught.

You'll need to smoke the meat for several hours.

(transitive) To preserve or prepare (food) for consumption by treating with smoke.

After opening one of the hives from the back, he smoked the bees to calm them and to drive the queen toward the front of the hive.

2019, Thomas D. Seeley, The Lives of Bees: The Untold Story of the Honey Bee in the Wild, page 64:

(transitive) To dry or medicate by smoke.

(transitive, obsolete) To fill or scent with smoke; hence, to fill with incense; to perfume.

Smoke your bits of glass,
Ye loyal Swine, or her transfiguration
Will blind your wondering eyes.

1820, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Oedipus Tyrannus; Or, Swellfoot The Tyrant: A Tragedy in Two Acts:

(transitive, obsolete) To make unclear or blurry.

The horn section was really smokin' on that last tune.

(intransitive, slang, chiefly as present participle) To perform (e.g. music) energetically or skillfully.

We smoked them at rugby.

Super Macho Man: 'I DON'T SMOKE... BUT TONIGHT I'M GONNA SMOKE YOU!'

1987, Punch-Out!!, Nintendo, published 1990, Nintendo Entertainment System, level/area: Super Macho Man:

"He can weasel out if^([sic]) it." Ibanez massaged her knuckles. "He can say Couch welshed on a deal, and didn't show, and that's why Karen got got. It isn't conclusive. I have another thing I can lay on him, but even the two combined won't do. We need a third smoking gun if we're really gonna smoke this son of a bitch."

2023 September 28, HarryBlank, “Hooking Up”, in SCP Foundation, archived from the original on 2024-05-25:

He got smoked by the mob.

Ordnancemen stenciled bombs with “greetings” on behalf of friends and loved ones back home or slogans playing on beer and cigarette advertisements, like “To Muammar: For all you do, this bomb's for you” or “I'd fly 10,000 miles to smoke a camel.”

1993, Joseph T. Stanik, "Swift and Effective Retribution": The U.S. Sixth Fleet and the Confrontation with Qaddafi (The U.S. Navy in the Modern World Series; 3), Naval Historical Center:

I had never met my father, and Precious's daddy had gotten smoked before she was even born.

2006, Noire [pseudonym], Thug-A-Licious: An Urban Erotic Tale, New York, N.Y.: One World, Ballantine Books, →ISBN, page 191:

(transitive, slang) To kill, especially with a gun.

(transitive, slang, obsolete) To thrash; to beat.

He was first smoked by the old Lord Lafeu.

c. 1604–1605 (date written), William Shakespeare, “All’s Well, that Ends Well”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene vi]:

I alone / Smok'd his true person, talk'd with him.

1614–1615, Homer, “(please specify the book number)”, in Geo[rge] Chapman, transl., Homer’s Odysses. […], London: […] Rich[ard] Field [and William Jaggard], for Nathaniell Butter, published 1615, →OCLC; republished in The Odysseys of Homer, […], volume (please specify the book number), London: John Russell Smith, […], 1857, →OCLC:

Upon that […] I began to smoke that they were a parcel of mummers.

1715 June 1 (Gregorian calendar), Joseph Addison, “The Free-holder: No. 44. Saturday, May 21. [1715.]”, in The Works of the Right Honourable Joseph Addison, Esq; […], volume IV, London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], published 1721, →OCLC:

The squire gave him a good curse at his departure; and then turning to the parson, he cried out, "I smoke it: I smoke it. Tom is certainly the father of this bastard. […]

1749, Henry Fielding, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC:

(obsolete, transitive) To smell out; to hunt out; to find out; to detect.

(slang, obsolete, transitive) To ridicule to the face; to mock.

The anger of the Lord and his jealousy shall smoke against that man.

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Deuteronomy 29:20:

Proud of his steeds, he smokes along the field.

1697, Virgil, “Aeneis”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:

To raise a dust or smoke by rapid motion.

Some of you shall smoke for it in Rome.

c. 1588–1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Lamentable Tragedy of Titus Andronicus”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene ii]:

(transitive, US military slang) To punish (a person) for a minor offense by excessive physical exercise.

(transitive) To cover (a key blank) with soot or carbon to aid in seeing the marks made by impressioning.

en-verb

smoke (third-person singular simple present smokes, present participle smoking, simple past and past participle smoked)

smokes (present singular third-person)
smoking (participle present)
smoked (participle past)
smoked (past)

have a smoke

to inhale and exhale smoke from a burning cigarette

Dutch: smoken

Sranan Tongo: smoko

دَخَّنَ

to inhale and exhale tobacco smoke regularly or habitually

afum

to preserve or prepare by treating with smoke

From Middle English smoken, from Old English smocian (“to smoke, emit smoke; fumigate”), from Proto-West Germanic *smokōn, from Proto-Germanic *smukōną (“to smoke”), ablaut derivative of Proto-Germanic *smaukaną (“to smoke”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)mewg- (“to smoke”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian smookje (“to smoke”), West Frisian smoke (“to smoke”), Dutch smoken (“to smoke”), Low German smöken (“to smoke”), German Low German smoken (“to smoke”). Related also to Old English smēocan (“to smoke, emit smoke; fumigate”), Bavarian schmuckelen (“to smell bad, reek”).