irrespirable
adjUS, UK /ɪɹɪˈspaɪɹəb(ə)l/
Etymology Either: * from ir- (prefix meaning ‘not’) + respirable; or * borrowed from French irrespirable, from Late Latin irrespīrābilis, from Latin ir- (a variant of in- (prefix meaning ‘not’)) + respīrāre + -ābilis (suffix meaning ‘able to be’). Respīrāre is the present active infinitive of respīrō (“to blow or breathe back; to breathe, respire; to breathe out, exhale”), from re- (prefix meaning ‘again; back, backwards’) + spīrō (“to blow; to breathe, respire; to breathe out, exhale”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *(s)peys- (“to blow; to breathe”)).
1
Not respirable; not suitable for breathing; unbreathable.
- The air was growing fouler and more irrespirable, with a thick, sodden quality, as if from a sediment of material rottenness; and we had about decided to turn back.1932 May, Clark Ashton Smith, “The Vaults of Yoh-Vombis”, in Farnsworth Wright, editor, Weird Tales: A Magazine of the Bizarre and Unusual, volume XIX, number 5, Indianapolis, Ind.: Popular Fiction Publishing Company, →OCLC, page 604, column 1:
- Related terms
- respiration, respirator, respiratory, respire