Definition of "intumescence" [in•tu•mes•cence]

• The act or process of swelling or the condition of being swollen. (noun)
• A swollen organ or body part. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "British America and the north of the United States, this phenomenon is explained by the flat conformation of the territories bordering on the pole, and on which there is no intumescence of the soil to oppose any obstacle to the north winds; here, in Lincoln Island, this explanation would not suffice."
• "Here, an intumescence which was to become a mountain, there, an abyss which was to be filled with an ocean or a sea."
• "For our present purpose hypertrophy may be considered as it affects the axile or the foliar organs, and also according to the way in which the increased size is manifested, as by increased thickness or swelling -- intumescence, or by augmented length-elongation, by expansion or flattening, or, lastly, by the formation of excrescences or outgrowths, which may be classed under the head of luxuriance or enation."