swelter

Meanings

Verb

• To suffer terribly from intense heat.
• To perspire greatly from heat.
• To cause to faint, to overpower, as with heat.

Noun

• Intense heat.

Origin

• From Middle English swelteren, frequentative form of Middle English swelten ("to die; faint"), from Old English sweltan ("to die"), from Proto-Germanic *sweltaną ("to die"), from Proto-Indo-European *swel- ("to smolder; burn"), equivalent to swelt + -er. More at swelt.