naphtha

From Latin naphtha, from Ancient Greek νάφθα (náphtha, “naphtha”), ultimately from Old Persian 𐎴𐎳𐎫 (naft). The Greek mediation is reflected in the spelling – ‘ph’ and ‘th’ (from ‘φ’ and ‘θ’).

• IPA^(key): /ˈnæpθə~ˈnæfθə/

naphtha (countable and uncountable, plural naphthas)

1. (dated) Naturally-occurring liquid petroleum.
2. Any of a wide variety of aliphatic or aromatic liquid hydrocarbon mixtures distilled from petroleum or coal tar, especially as used in solvents or petrol.
   • 1918, W. B. Maxwell, chapter 7, in The Mirror and the Lamp:

     The turmoil went on—no rest, no peace. […] It was nearly eleven o'clock now, and he strolled out again. In the little fair created by the costers' barrows the evening only seemed beginning; and the naphtha flares made one's eyes ache, the men's voices grated harshly, and the girls' faces saddened one.

   • 1973, Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow:

     No, this is not a disentanglement from, but a progressive knotting into — they go in under archways, secret entrances of rotted concrete that only looked like loops of an underpass... certain trestles of blackened wood have moved slowly by overhead, and the smells begun of coal from days far to the past, smells of naphtha winters, of Sundays when no traffic came through...

   • 1995, Philip Pullman, Northern Lights:

     The Common Room and the Library were lit by anbaric light, but the Scholars preferred the older, softer naphtha lamps in the Retiring Room.

• napthās

From Ancient Greek νάφθα (náphtha).

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈnapʰ.tʰa/

naphtha f (genitive napthae); first declension

1. naphtha

First declension.

• naphtha in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• naphtha in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire Illustré Latin-Français, Hachette