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The Latin word suffendere, ancestor to suffuse by way of Latin suffūsus, has various meanings that shed light on our modern word, among them "to pour on or in (as an addition)" and "to fill with a liquid, color, or light that wells up from below." It’s no surprise, then, that suffuse refers to the action of fluid or light spreading over or through something, as when light fills a dark room when you crack open a door. Suffundere is a blend of the prefix sub- ("under" or "beneath") and the verb fundere ("to pour" or "to send forth"). Other English verbs related to fundere continue the theme of pouring or spreading: diffuse ("to pour out and spread freely"), effuse ("to pour or flow out"), transfuse ("to cause to pass from one to another"), and the verb fuse itself when it's used to mean "to meld or join."
Examples of suffuse in a Sentence
Jill Lepore, New Yorker, 18 May 2026
The rest of the film consists of the brother and sister’s return to the ranch, now suffused with dread at Misael’s inability to properly care for his sibling.
—Vadim Rizov, IndieWire, 16 May 2026
The 63-year-old auteur, winner of the Cannes Palme d’Or in 2018 for Shoplifters, has made his indelible imprint on world cinema with delicate family drama, suffused with wry humor and wrenching humanism, far more so than futurism.
—Patrick Brzeski, HollywoodReporter, 15 May 2026
After suffusing some of this lunar simulant with helium-3, Interlune will use those samples to test its extraction methods.
—Robin George Andrews, Scientific American, 14 May 2026
See All Example Sentences for suffuse
Cite this Entry
“Suffuse.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suffuse. Accessed 20 May. 2026.
Copy CitationKids Definition
suffuse
verb
Medical Definition
suffuse
transitive verb
