[f. next, corresp. to a Latin type *tumēscentia.] A becoming tumid, swelling up; a tendency to tumidity; also concr. a tumid part, a swelling.
1859. R. F. Burton, Centr. Afr., in Jrnl. Geog. Soc., XXIX. 321. Tumescence … appears to characterize the human as it does the vegetable productions of Inner Africa.
1874. Nasmyth & Carpenter, Moon, Contents p. xiii. Scrope’s Hypothesis of Terrestrial Tumescences.
1901–6. H. Ellis, in Westermarck, Orig. & Devel. Moral Ideas, xl. (1908), II. 374. Erethistic excitement which produces sexual tumescence.
