Plume

How to spell plume

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce plume

What does plume mean?

1. nounA long, soft feather or cluster of feathers, often used as decoration.
2. nounA column of smoke, dust, or liquid that rises and spreads upward into the air.
3. verbTo rise and spread upward in a column, or to preen and arrange feathers.

Plume in a sentence

• noun

  A single ostrich plume decorated the front of her hat.

• noun

  A thick plume of smoke rose above the burning warehouse.

• verb

  Smoke began to plume from the chimney as the fire caught.

• noun

  The soldier's helmet carried a tall red plume for the parade.

• noun

  The volcano sent a plume of ash high into the sky.

• verb

  Steam can plume from the kettle long after it boils.

Where does plume come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word goes back to the Latin pluma, which meant a small soft feather or the layer of down closest to a bird's body, as opposed to the stiffer flight feathers. From Latin it passed into Old French as plume, where it broadened to mean a feather in general and even came to mean a pen, because writing quills were cut from feathers. English borrowed it in the late 1300s, keeping the showy, decorative associations of a tall feather worn in a hat or helmet. Over time the shape of a feather lent itself to a figurative use, so a rising column of smoke or water that fans out at the top also became a plume. The silent feel of the final 'e' and the 'u' that sounds like 'oo' are both inheritances from the French spelling, which is why writers sometimes hesitate over the vowel.

How the word is built

• plume (whole word, from Latin pluma: a soft feather or down); no separable prefix or suffix