Fragrant

How to spell fragrant

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce fragrant

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does fragrant mean?

1. adjectiveHaving a pleasant or sweet smell.

Fragrant in a sentence

• The kitchen filled with the smell of fragrant herbs as the sauce simmered.

• She chose a fragrant candle to freshen the living room.

Where does fragrant come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word descends from the Latin verb fragrare, which meant 'to give off a sweet or strong smell'. Its present participle fragrans (stem fragrant-) literally described something 'smelling sweet', and that participle is the direct source of the modern adjective. English took it in through French in the late 1400s and early 1500s, settling on the spelling that preserves the Latin -ant ending. The same root survives in the noun 'fragrance' and is a distant relative of 'flagrant', though the two have drifted far apart in meaning. The silent, unstressed second syllable is the spelling trap: people often expect an 'e' (as in 'fragrent'), but the Latin -ant ending keeps the 'a'.

How the word is built

• fragr- (from fragrare: to emit a sweet smell)
• -ant (adjective suffix)