different between profusion vs rankness

English

Etymology

From Middle French profusion, from Late Latin profusio

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /p?o??fju??n/, /p???fju??n/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /p??(?)?fju???n/
• Rhymes: -u???n
• Hyphenation: pro?fu?sion

Noun

profusion (countable and uncountable, plural profusions)

1. abundance; the state of being profuse; a cornucopia

   His hair, in great profusion, streamed down over his shoulders.

   • 1918, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Land That Time Forgot Chapter VI

     We set the men at work felling trees, selecting for the purpose jarrah, a hard, weather-resisting timber which grew in profusion near by.
2. lavish or imprudent expenditure; prodigality or extravagance

Translations

French

Noun

profusion f (plural profusions)

1. profusion

Derived terms

Further reading

• “profusion” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

English

Etymology

From rank +? -ness.

Noun

rankness (countable and uncountable, plural ranknesses)

1. The quality of being rank, of having a repulsive or pungent odor.
   • 1578, Raphael Holinshed et al., Chronicles of England, Scotlande, and Irelande, Volume I, Book 3, Chapter 1 “Of cattell kept for profit,” p. 222,^[1]

     […] the bowels of the beast are commonlie cast awaie because of their ranknesse […]

   • 1933, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, South Moon Under, Chapter 34,^[2]

     A match scratched and the sweet rankness of his corn-cob pipe drifted through the rooms.

2. Exuberant or uncontrolled growth.
   • 1706, John Dryden, “To my Dear Friend Mr. Congreve, On His Comedy, call’d, The Double-Dealer” in The Double Dealer by William Congreve, London: Jacob Tonson,^[3]

     Like Janus he the stubborn Soil manur’d,

     With Rules of Husbandry the Rankness cur’d:

     Tam’d us to Manners, when the Stage was rude;

     And boistrous English Wit, with Art indu’d.

   • 1847, Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights, Chapter 18,^[4]

     […] a wilderness of weeds, to be sure, whose rankness far over-topped their neglected growth; yet, notwithstanding, evidence of a wealthy soil, that might yield luxuriant crops under other and favourable circumstances.

   • 1970, Barry Unsworth, The Hide, New York: Norton, 1997, p. 139,^[5]

     […] briar and bramble shoots lay athwart one’s path with thorns like arrowheads often concealed in tangles of grass and willowherb and cow parsley, while underlying this rankness, like a reminder of a more elegant epoch, one was aware at times of Howard’s cultivation, rose and magnolia and peony continued to flower […]

3. (obsolete) Exuberance, excessiveness.
   • c. 1612, William Shakespeare and John Fletcher, Henry VIII, Act IV, Scene 1,^[6]

     First Gentleman. God save you, sir! where have you been broiling?

     Third Gentleman. Among the crowd i’ the Abbey; where a finger

     Could not be wedged in more: I am stifled

     With the mere rankness of their joy.

4. (obsolete) Insolence.
   • c. 1599, William Shakespeare, As You Like It, Act I, Scene 1,^[7]

     I will physic your rankness […]

Translations