tramontana

American  

[trah-muhn-tah-nuh, -tan-uh, trah-mawn-tah-nah] / ˌtrɑ mənˈtɑ nə, -ˈtæn ə, ˌtrɑ mɔnˈtɑ nɑ /

noun

plural

tramontanas,

plural

tramontane

1. a cold wind from the north or northeast that blows in the western Mediterranean.

2. any north wind issuing from a mountainous region.

---

Etymology

Origin of tramontana

1605–15; < Italian, noun use of feminine of tramontano tramontane

Example Sentences

The north wind is scarce at this time of the year, but a beautiful tramontana blew during the time we were working out of the Bocca.

From Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 by Various

The howling mistral or tramontana makes the doors bang, the reeds scream, and a range of noises that make the great, natural clamour all around.

From Letters from my Windmill by Daudet, Alphonse

I have taken to ass's milk to counteract the tramontana, and he is in the twenty-first and I in the twenty-second volume of Alexandre Dumas's 'Memoirs.'

From The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume II by Kenyon, Frederic G. (Frederic George), Sir

He will not so much need them out-of-doors in a Genoese January, unless a tramontana is blowing, and there was none on our half-day.

From Roman Holidays, and Others by Howells, William Dean

At Perugia, last spring, through weeks of tramontana, how one yearned for the sight of yellow English primroses!

From Post-Prandial Philosophy by Allen, Grant