smudge

• (UK, US) IPA^(key): /smʌdʒ/

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• Rhymes: -ʌdʒ

smudge (countable and uncountable, plural smudges)

1. A blemish or smear, especially a dark or sooty one.

   There was a smudge on the paper.

2. Dense smoke, such as that used for fumigation.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Grose to this entry?)

3. (US) A heap of damp combustibles partially ignited and burning slowly, placed on the windward side of a house, tent, etc. to keep off mosquitoes or other insects.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Bartlett to this entry?)

4. (paganism, especially in the phrase "smudge stick" = "stick of incense") A quantity of herbs used in suffumigation.
   • 2006, Christian Rätsch, ‎Claudia Müller-Ebeling, Pagan Christmas: The Plants, Spirits, and Rituals →ISBN:

     Devil's dirt or asafetida ground together with fenugreek and black cumin seed is used as a smudge against witches and […]

• (blemish, smear): blur, smear, stain

• smudge attack

From Middle English smogen.

smudge (third-person singular simple present smudges, present participle smudging, simple past and past participle smudged)

1. To obscure by blurring; to smear.
2. To soil or smear with dirt.
3. To use dense smoke to protect from insects.
4. To stifle or smother with smoke.
5. (paganism, intransitive) To burn herbs as a cleansing ritual (suffumigation).
6. (paganism, transitive) To subject to ritual burning of herbs (suffumigation, smudging).
   • 2013, Rachel Patterson, Pagan Portals - Hoodoo: Folk Magic →ISBN:

     This is easily done using incense to smudge yourself or taking a cleansing bath. To smudge your body use an incense mixture such as sandalwood, lavender, frankincense or myrrh.

• (to obscure by blurring): blur, smear
• (to soil or smear with dirt): smutch, soil
• (to use smoke against insects): fumigate

• smudgily
• smudginess
• smudgy

• Mudges, degums