2018年7月12日 · Multiple 19th-century instances of 'imflammable' in the same article. There are a couple of instances from the nineteenth century in which imflammable appears twice on the same page, lessening the possibility that its occurrence was a simple typo, but perhaps increasing the possibility that it was written by someone who didn't know how to spell inflammable.

It's just a bit of historical US "country-bumpkin-speak", whereas flammable and inflammable are both perfectly valid words. In principle they're totally interchangeable, but I don't think I've ever seen a tanker carrying Inflammable Liquid. Personally, I associate Inflammable with stuff that's intended to burn (under appropriate control, of ...

2015年2月28日 · Ngram inflammable vs flammable. from The grammarist: There is no difference in meaning between flammable and inflammable. Both describe things that are capable of burning or easy to ignite, but in all modern varieties of English, flammable is preferred. Inflammable, derived from the verb inflame, is the original word.

In my opinion, the word flammable was unnecessary: there's not much confusion possible in seeing, on a gas/petrol tanker, the words "Warning: Highly inflammable". It seems to me there's more confusion about the meaning of inflammable when the word "flammable" exists, than when it doesn't. But where "flammable" is already common enough, it's ...

2013年3月29日 · The common word meaning "combustible" is inflammable. But some people are thrown off by the in- and think inflammable means "not combustible." For this reason, trucks carrying gasoline or explosives are now marked FLAMMABLE. Unless you are operating such a truck and hence are concerned with the safety of children and illiterates, use inflammable.'

inflammable [same as previous] Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary, Sixth Edition (1949): combustible [same as previous] flammable, adj. Capable of being easily ignited; inflammable;—preferred by many technical writers and publications to the older equivalent inflammable because of possible misinterpretation of the prefix in-as negative.

Somewhat related to this question, I am curious to know what words in English would seem to be opposites at first blush but are in fact synonyms? Immediately I can think of flammable and inflammable.

"Flammable and inflammable both mean capable of burning. The word "inflammable" came from Latin inflammāre = "to set fire to," where the prefix "in-" means "in" as in "indoctrinate", rather than "not" as in "invisible" and "ineligible". Nonetheless, "inflammable" is often erroneously thought to mean "non-flammable"."

The reason for the prefix in-in invaluable is that it originally meant simply "impossible to value". It has somehow acquired the more specific meaning that it is impossible to value because its value is infinitely high.

2011年11月1日 · To did not come from unto (if anything, vice versa), so the situation is not the same as with flammable and inflammable. Though to is an older form, unto was never as prevalent, and is now either archaic, or used in limited contexts, such as …