odorous

odorous, fragrant, redolent, aromatic, balmy mean emitting and diffusing scent.

Odorous applies to whatever has a strong, distinctive smell, whether it is pleasant or not

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odorous flowers such as lilies, tuberoses, and narcissuses

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odorous chemicals are often malodorous

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odorous gums from the East— Wilde

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ability to detect and to identify infinitesimally small traces of odorous and savory materials— Morrison

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Fragrant applies to something with a sweet and agreeable odor, especially to flowers, fruits, spices, and beverages that through their lingering sweetness or richness of scent give sensuous delight

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fragrant roses

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where the fragrant limes their boughs unite, we met—and we parted forever!— Crawford

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perhaps far back . . . certain Chinese preferred fragrant tea to insipid water— Heiser

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the recollection that these unfortunates had once been fragrant children— Cheever

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Redolent occasionally means pleasantly odorous; in such use it applies not only to things that diffuse a scent but to the scent itself

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the redolent scent of pine

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every flower and every fruit the redolent breath of the warm seawind ripeneth— Tennyson

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More often it applies to a place or thing impregnated with odors, especially with those that are penetrating

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dim, shady wood roads, redolent of fern and bayberry— Millay

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ordinary salt air but stronger, redolent of seaweed, damp, and dead fish— Nancy Hale

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the air for half a block was redolent with the fumes of beer and whiskey— Asbury

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Aromatic is more restricted in its implications than aroma, for it distinctively suggests a pungent, often fresh, odor of the kind associated with the foliage of balsams, pine, and spruce, the wood of cedar, the dried leaves of lavender, such spices as cloves, and such gums as myrrh. It is therefore often applied to preparations scented with substances that are aromatic

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aromatic blends of tobacco

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as aromatic plants bestow no spicy fragrance while they grow; but crushed, or trodden to the ground, diffuse their balmy sweets around— Goldsmith

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aromatic spirit of ammonia

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Balmy applies chiefly to things which have a delicate and soothing aromatic odor

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the balmy winds breathed the animating odors of the groves around me— Bartram

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their tender beauty of balmy, flowery vegetation— Muir

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Antonyms: malodorous: odorless

Contrasted words: stinking, fetid, noisome, putrid, rank, rancid, fusty, musty (see MALODOROUS)