Noun

(en noun)

The state of being swollen.

* {{quote-book

, year= a1420 , year_published= 1894 , author= The British Museum Additional MS, 12,056 , by= (Lanfranc of Milan) , title= Lanfranc's "Science of cirurgie." , url= http://books.google.com/books?id=6XktAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA63 , original= , chapter= Wounds complicated by the Dislocation of a Bone , section= , isbn= 1163911380 , edition= , publisher= K. Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co , location= London , editor= Robert von Fleischhacker , volume= , page= 63 , passage= Ne take noon hede to brynge togidere þe parties of þe boon þat is to-broken or dislocate, til viij. daies ben goon in þe wyntir, & v. in þe somer; for þanne it schal make quytture, and be sikir from swellynge ; & þanne brynge togidere þe brynkis eiþer þe disiuncture after þe techynge þat schal be seid in þe chapitle of algebra. }}

Anything swollen, especially any abnormally swollen part of the body.

Noun

(en noun)

(uncountable) the process of swelling up or the condition of being swollen

(countable) an instance of such swelling

*1755 , , A Dictionary of the English Language , 10:

*:...but there are other causes of change, which, though slow in their operation, and invisible in their progress, are perhaps as much superior to human resistance, as the revolutions of the sky, or intumescence of the tide.