[f. L. fulgur lightning + -ITE.]

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  1.  Geol. (See quot. 1865.) Also written (less correctly) fulgorite.

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1834.  Mrs. Somerville, Connex. Phys. Sc., xxvii. (1835), 312. Dr. Fiedler exhibited several of these fulgorites in London … dug out of the sandy plains of Silesia and Eastern Prussia.

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1845.  Darwin, Voy. Nat., iii. (1852), 60. At Paris MM. Hachette and Beudant succeeded in making tubes in most respect similar to these fulgurites.

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1865.  D. Page, Handbk. Geol. Terms, Fulgurite, Fulgorite.—Any rocky substance that has been fused or vitrified by lightning. More strictly applied to a bore or tube produced by the passage of lightning into a sandy soil, which it sometimes penetrates to a depth of twenty feet, fusing and vitrifying the sand and gravel in its downward progress.

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1884.  Cornh. Mag., Nov., 526. In sand or rock, where lightning has struck, it often forms long hollow tubes, known to the calmly discriminating geological intelligence as fulgurites.

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  2.  An explosive substance (see quot. 1889).

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1882.  H. S. Drinker, Tunnelling (ed. 2), 102.

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1889.  Cundill, Dict. Explosives, Fulgurite consists of nitro-glycerine mixed with some coarsely ground farinaceous substance.

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1894.  Daily News, 22 Jan., 5/5. At Geneva a trial has been made in a quarry with the new explosive, ‘fulgurite,’ under the direction of the inventor, Raoul Pictet.

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