SMUT • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Smut

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/smət/ Listen

noun

Smut n.

1.

Foul matter, like soot or coal dust; also, a spot or soil made by such matter.

2.

(Mining) Bad, soft coal, containing much earthy matter, found in the immediate locality of faults.

3.

(Bot.) An infection of cereal grains producing a swelling which is at length resolved into a powdery sooty mass. It is caused by parasitic fungi of the genus Ustilago. Ustilago segetum, or Ustilago Carbo, is the commonest kind; that of Indian corn is Ustilago maydis.

4.

Obscene language; ribaldry; obscenity. "He does not stand upon decency... but will talk smut, though a priest and his mother be in the room."

Smut mill, a machine for cleansing grain from smut.

verb

Smut v. t. (past & past part. smutted; pres. part. smutting)

1.

To stain or mark with smut; to blacken with coal, soot, or other dirty substance.

2.

To taint with mildew, as grain.

3.

To blacken; to sully or taint; to tarnish.

4.

To clear of smut; as, to smut grain for the mill.

Smut v. i.

1.

To gather smut; to be converted into smut; to become smutted.

2.

To give off smut; to crock.

See images of 'Smut'

Etymology of 'Smut'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Smut" Quotes from Famous Books

... iron furnaces, puddling furnaces, and coal-pit engine furnaces. By day and by night the country is glowing with fire, and the smoke of the ironworks hovers over it. There is a rumbling and clanking of iron forges and rolling mills. Workmen covered with smut, and with fierce white eyes, are seen moving about amongst the glowing iron and the dull thud of forge-hammers. Amidst these flaming, smoky, clanging works, I beheld the remains of what had once been happy farmhouses, now ruined and deserted. The ground underneath them ...

— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth

... a "poor," they were highly paid, badly housed, and deeply resentful. They went in vast droves to football matches, and did not care a rap if it rained. The prevailing wind was sarcastic. To come here from London was to come from atmospheric blue-greys to ashen-greys, from smoke and soft smut to ...

— Soul of a Bishop • H. G. Wells

... vice, which haunts the sewing-circle and the parlor as well as the club-room. They do not, of course, often descend to those black depths of vulgarity to which the coarser sex will go, but couch in finer terms the same foul thoughts, and hide in loose insinuations more smut than words could well express. Women who think themselves rare paragons of virtue can find no greater pleasure than in the discussion of the latest scandal, speculations about the chastity of Mrs. A. or Mr. B., and gossip about the "fall" of this man's daughter ...

— Plain Facts for Old and Young • John Harvey Kellogg

... Nights, which is so "pornographic" that the price of the first volume has actually risen from a pound to twenty-five shillings. Further down, in the very same column, the P.M.G. gloats proudly over the fact that thirty-five shillings have been given for a single copy of its own twopennyworth of smut. ...

— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton

... kind of inspectin' done by the army officer assigned to this particular plant. I had to smile, too, when I saw Mr. Marvin towin' him through our shop Saturday forenoon. Maybe they was three minutes breezin' through. And I didn't need the extra smear of smut on my face. Marvin never glanced my way. This was the same officer who'd been in on ...

— The House of Torchy • Sewell Ford

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