Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Parched with the heat of the sun; intensely hot.
  • adjective Scorching; burning.
  • adjective Passionate; ardent.
  • adjective Hurried; rapid.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Parched and dry with heat, especially of the sun; arid; sultry; hot; specifically, noting a zone of the earth's surface.
  • Burning; scorching; parching.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Parched; dried with heat.
  • adjective Violenty hot; drying or scorching with heat; burning; parching.
  • adjective (Geog.) that space or board belt of the earth, included between the tropics, over which the sun is vertical at some period of every year, and the heat is always great.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Very hot and dry.
  • adjective Full of intense emotions arising from sexual love; ardent and passionate.
  • adjective Full of difficulty.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective extremely hot
  • adjective emotionally charged and vigorously energetic
  • adjective characterized by intense emotion

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin torridus, from torrēre, to parch; see ters- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin torridus, from torrere ("parch, scorch").

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Examples

  • It seems, however, from the facts before us that the different zones on the sun, corresponding to what we call the torrid and temperate zones on the earth, persist in rotating with velocities which gradually decrease from the equator towards the poles.

    The Story of the Heavens 1876

  • Each game will probably be like Thursday, the two in torrid conflict, until one team finally cracks.

    USATODAY.com - Spurs grease Pistons in Game 1 2005

  • Richard Burton, is a living proof that intense work, mental and physical, sojourn in torrid and frozen climes, danger from dagger and from pestilence, 'age' a person of good sound constitution far less than may be supposed ....

    The Romance of Isabel, Lady Burton William Henry Burton Wilkins 1897

  • Orwell composed that novel of aching remembrance in torrid Morocco, so I make no apology for saying that McEwan put me in mind, twice, of John Keats as he gazed on the work of ancient Attica: “Thou still unravish’d bride of quietness/Thou foster-child of silence and slow time.”

    Think of England 2007

  • Orwell composed that novel of aching remembrance in torrid Morocco, so I make no apology for saying that McEwan put me in mind, twice, of John Keats as he gazed on the work of ancient Attica: “Thou still unravish’d bride of quietness/Thou foster-child of silence and slow time.”

    Think of England 2007

  • The district attorney who defended the Texas law criminalizing homosexuality before the US Supreme Court is desperately trying to keep his job following the discovery of e-mails containing sexually explicit videos, racist jokes and what is described as torrid love notes to his executive secretary.

    DesignerBlog Will 2008

  • The equatorial region of the earth, otherwise known as the torrid clime, was considered impassable by ship.

    Christians With Closed Hearts And Minds James F. McGrath 2008

  • The district attorney who defended the Texas law criminalizing homosexuality before the US Supreme Court is desperately trying to keep his job following the discovery of e-mails containing sexually explicit videos, racist jokes and what is described as torrid love notes to his executive secretary.

    Archive 2008-01-01 Will 2008

  • I had carried Nat forth into the glade before the hut, where the sun might fall on him temperately, after a torrid day -- torrid, that is to say, on the heights, but in our hollow, pight about with the trees, the air had clung heavily.

    Sir John Constantine Memoirs of His Adventures At Home and Abroad and Particularly in the Island of Corsica: Beginning with the Year 1756 Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch 1903

  • The central region, lying beneath the track of the sun, was termed the torrid zone; the two regions between the tropics and the polar circles were termed the temperate zones, and the remaining parts, between the porlar circles and the poles, the frigid zones.

    The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus Irving, Washington, 1783-1859 1892

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