wildfire

[ wahyld-fahyuhr ]
See synonyms for wildfire on Thesaurus.com
noun
  1. any large fire in brush, forests, or open spaces that spreads rapidly and is hard to extinguish.

  2. a highly flammable composition, such as Greek fire, difficult to extinguish when ignited, formerly used in warfare.

  1. sheet lightning, unaccompanied by thunder.

  2. the ignis fatuus or a similar light.

  3. Plant Pathology. a disease of tobacco and soybeans, characterized by brown, necrotic spots, each surrounded by a yellow band, on the leaves and caused by the bacterium Pseudomonas tabaci.

  4. Pathology Obsolete. erysipelas or some similar disease.

Origin of wildfire

1
First recorded before 1000; Middle English wildefire, Old English wildfȳr; equivalent to wild + fire

Words Nearby wildfire

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use wildfire in a sentence

British Dictionary definitions for wildfire

wildfire

/ (ˈwaɪldˌfaɪə) /


noun
  1. a highly flammable material, such as Greek fire, formerly used in warfare

    • a raging and uncontrollable fire

    • anything that is disseminated quickly (esp in the phrase spread like wildfire)

  1. lightning without audible thunder

  2. another name for will-o'-the-wisp

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Idioms and Phrases with wildfire

wildfire

see spread like wildfire.

The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.