Fog

How to spell fog

3 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce fog

What does fog mean?

1. nounA thick cloud of tiny water droplets suspended near the ground that reduces visibility.
2. verbTo cover or become covered with a film of condensation or mist that blurs a surface.

Fog in a sentence

• noun

  The morning fog delayed every flight out of the airport.

• verb

  The hot shower will fog the bathroom mirror within seconds.

• noun

  Dense fog rolled across the motorway and slowed the traffic to a crawl.

• verb

  Cold air can fog the inside of the windscreen on a winter drive.

Where does fog come from?

Language of origin: Unknown

The origin of fog is genuinely uncertain, which is why dictionaries hedge on it. The weather sense, meaning a thick cloud of water droplets near the ground, appears in English only from the late 1500s, and it may be a back-formation from the slightly older adjective 'foggy'. That adjective probably linked to an even earlier noun 'fog' meaning long, rank grass left standing in a field over winter, a sense still found in some northern dialects. Several scholars connect the whole family to a Scandinavian source, comparing the Danish 'fog' meaning 'spray' or 'driving snow' and related Old Norse words for drifting moisture. Because no single line of descent can be proven, the safest summary is that fog grew up among the languages of the North Sea region rather than arriving by a clean, traceable borrowing. The short, blunt spelling is at least easy: one syllable, three letters, no silent traps.

How the word is built

• fog (single root, no affixes)