Word Pronunciation & Dictionary

afflatus

/əˈfleɪtəs/

Word Rarity Very rare

Frequency: 1.15 in modern English

Syllables: af-fla-tus
IPA: /əˈfleɪtəs/

14

Scrabble Score

8

Letters

3

Syllables

6

Unique Chars

Meaning

noun

A sudden rush of creative impulse or inspiration, often attributed to divine influence.

Example Sentences

"divine afflatus"
"'Tis extremely difficult to keep up the Spirit of Poetry in another's Compoſitions, tho' you catch all the […] apteſt Moments; and never employ the Mind, but when there is an Impetus comes upon it toward that particular buſineſs: […] I know not how far this was the Caſe with Mr. [Alexander] Pope, in this performance: but wherever it was, the Poet will be little more than a common Man: He is, at ſuch times, much the ſame as a Prophet without his Afflatus."
"[…] Men acted by seducing spirits: for πνεύματα doth often signify the impulses or afflatuses of good or evil spirits; […] You are zealous, πνευματων, of spiritual gifts, or afflatuses, and so throughout the chapter; […]"
"He used to gallop Rebecca over the neighbouring Dumpling Downs, or into the county town, which, if you please, we shall call Chatteris, spouting his own poems, and filled with quite a Byronic afflatus as he thought."
"We had been talking about the masters who had achieved but a single masterpiece,—the artists and poets who but once in their lives had known the divine afflatus, and touched the high level of the best."
"Miss Verena was a natural genius, and he hoped very much she [Miss Chancellor] wasn't going to take the nature out of her. She could study up as she went along; she had got the great thing that you couldn't learn, a kind of divine afflatus, as the ancients used to say, and she had better just begin on that."

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from Latin afflātus (“breath, blowing or breathing on, spiritual inspiration”), from afflō (“to blow, breathe on or towards”) + -tus (forming action nouns), from ad- (“to, towards”) + flō (“breathe, blow”). See also af-.

Word Breakdown

Prefix: ad-

Regional Pronunciation

American English: /əˈfleɪtəs/
British English: /əˈfleɪtəs/

Inflected Forms

afflatuses (plural)

Frequently Paired Words

afflate deflate deflation flatulence flatus inflate inflation

Synonyms

afflation

Rhymes With

status apparatus hiatus stratus comitatus cincinnatus meatus quadratus latus flatus nimbostratus altostratus

Questions

How do you pronounce afflatus?: The recorded pronunciation is /əˈfleɪtəs/.
What does afflatus mean?: A sudden rush of creative impulse or inspiration, often attributed to divine influence.
Where does afflatus come from?: Unadapted borrowing from Latin afflātus (“breath, blowing or breathing on, spiritual inspiration”), from afflō (“to blow, breathe on or towards”) + -tus (forming action nouns), from ad- (“to, towards”) + flō (“breathe, blow”). See also af-.

How to pronounce afflatus

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