[ad. med. or mod.L. turgēscentia: see next and -ENCE. So mod.F. turgescence (1752).]
1. The action or condition of swelling up; the fact or state of being swollen.
1631. Jorden, Nat. Bathes, xiv. (1632), 106. Animals haue their set times when their spermatick spirits are in turgescence.
1737. Bracken, Farriery Impr. (1763), 47. Any Turgescence or Swelling of the Blood-Vessels.
1843. R. J. Graves, Syst. Clin. Med., ix. 98. That turgescence of the cerebral vessels which precedes apoplectic seizures.
1875. Bennett & Dyer, Sachs’ Bot., 634. The pressure caused by the tension and turgescence of the tissues.
2. fig. a. Progressive swelling or increase. b. Inflation, pomposity, bombast.
1806. W. Taylor, in Ann. Rev., IV. 244. The turgescence of effort travelling at every hitch from head to tail. Ibid. (1813), in Monthly Rev., LXX. 451. A marked tendency to affectation, to turgescence.
