miasm-, miasma-, miasmat- +

A self-produced offensive odor.

In homeopathy, a block to healing caused by a predisposition to a particular disease in someone or in his or her family.

1. Noxious exhalations from putrescent organic matter; poisonous effluvia or germs polluting the atmosphere.
2. A dangerous, foreboding or deathlike influence or atmosphere including a thick vaporous atmosphere or emanation.
3. A poisonous atmosphere formerly thought to rise from swamps and putrid matter and to cause diseases.
4. A poisonous vapor or mist believed to be made up of particles from decomposing material that could cause disease and could be identified by its foul smell.

1. A reference to pollutants in the air from putrescent organic matter.
2. The description of poisonous effluvia or germs polluting the atmosphere; miasma.
3. Referring to dangerous, foreboding, or deathlike influences or atmospheres.

1. A noxious atmosphere or influence.
2. A poisonous atmosphere formerly thought to rise from swamps and putrid matter and cause disease.
3. A thick vaporous atmosphere or emanation: "The room was wreathed in a miasma of cigarette smoke."

An explanation of the origin of epidemics, based on the false notion that they were caused by air of bad quality; that is, emanating from rotting vegetation in marshes or swamps.

The miasmatic theory of disease began in the Middle Ages and continued on to the mid 1800s, when it was used to explain the spread of cholera in London and in Paris, partly explaining Haussmann's latter renovation of the French capital.

Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann (March 27, 1809–January 11, 1891) was a French civic planner whose name is associated with the rebuilding of Paris. He was born in that city of a Protestant family from Alsace. The Haussmann Renovations, or Haussmannization of Paris was a work led under the initiative of Napoléon III and the Seine préfet, Haussmann, from 1852 to 1870.

The project encompassed all aspects of urban planning, both in the center of Paris and in the outside districts: streets and boulevards, regulations imposed on façades of buildings, public parks, sewers and water works, city facilities and public monuments.

The disease was said to be preventable by cleansing and scouring of the body and items. Dr. William Farr, the assistant commissioner for the 1851 London census, was an important supporter of the miasma theory. He believed that cholera was transmitted by air, and that there was a deadly concentration of miasmata near the Thames River banks.

Another proponent of the miasmatic theory was the famous Crimean War nurse, Florence Nightingale (1820-1910), who was made famous for her work in making hospitals sanitary and fresh-smelling.

A reference to or caused by miasma.

1. Containing, or relating to, miasma.
2. Caused by miasma; such as, miasmatic diseases.

Someone who has made a special study of miasma.

1. A descriptive word for a noxious stench from atmospheric pollution; filled with vapor.
2. Pertaining to a miasma or a poisonous vapor or mist that was once widely believed to be made up of particles from decomposing material which could cause disease and which could be identified by its foul odors.

The study of unwholesome or noxious atmospheres, effluvia, or emanations.

1. Unwholesome atmospheres: "This novel spins miasmas of death and decay."
2. Unhealthy vapors rising from the ground or other sources: "I couldn't determine which was worse, the miasmas of the marshes or the miasmas of cigar smoke; because I consider both of them as pollutions of the atmosphere."