Chimney

How to spell chimney

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce chimney

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does chimney mean?

1. nounA vertical structure or pipe that carries smoke and gases from a fire or furnace up and out of a building.

Chimney in a sentence

• A sweep arrived to clean the soot from the chimney.

• Smoke curled steadily from every chimney on the terrace.

Where does chimney come from?

Language of origin: French

This word travelled into English through Old French cheminee, which described a fireplace or the flue above it. The French form came from Late Latin caminata, meaning a room fitted with a fireplace, which in turn rests on the Latin caminus, meaning a furnace, forge, or hearth. The Latin itself was borrowed from the Greek kaminos, the word for an oven or kiln. English took the word in the 1300s, and over time the meaning narrowed from the whole fireplace to the vertical structure that carries smoke up and out of a building. The spelling keeps a faint trace of that French ending, which is why it finishes in -ney rather than the -ly that many people mistakenly say aloud.

How the word is built

• chimn- (from Latin caminus: furnace, hearth)
• -ey (anglicised noun ending from French -ee)