Dictionary

dephlegm en · VERB

Etymology

From de- + phlegm; compare French déphlegmer, déflegmer.

Meanings

1. (obsolete, physical) To rid of phlegm or water; to dephlegmate.
   • Having almost filled a vial, capable of containing near a pound of human blood, with a mixture of that, and some rectify'd spirit of wine, by guess a fourth, or an eighth part; at the end of above three years, looking upon the same glass, stopt with nothing but a cork, we found it coagulated, or of a consistent form: when the vessel being unstopp'd, there appeared no sign of putrefaction in the blood; and having smelt to it, we could not perceive that it was fetid: so balsamic a vertue has dephlegmed spirit of wine to preserve it. 1684, Robert Boyle, Memoirs for the Natural History of the Human Blood:

Forms