sooty

[ soot-ee, soo-tee ]

adjective

, soot·i·er, soot·i·est.

1. covered, blackened, or smirched with soot.
2. consisting of or resembling soot.
3. of a black, blackish, or dusky color.

sooty

/ ˈsʊtɪ /

adjective

1. covered with soot
2. resembling or consisting of soot

Derived Forms

• ˈsootiness, noun
• ˈsootily, adverb

Other Words From

• sooti·ly adverb
• sooti·ness noun
• un·sooty adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of sooty¹

Middle English word dating back to 1200–50; soot, -y ¹

Example Sentences

It’s the population of New Yorkers who got one another through that sooty, uncertain time of despair and signed on for anything and everything that might lie ahead.

From Time

To the amazement of mission scientists, Voyager 2 sent back images of sooty plumes shooting 5 miles into the air and trailing for hundreds of miles.

From Nautilus

Essential community spaces — a library, Dunbar Grade School, Frissell Memorial Hospital, and churches — were charred to bits, and even the trees that lined the once-bustling streets became sooty figures drooping over a wasteland.

From Vox

As intense fires propel dark, sooty aerosols high into the air, they mix with clouds and mostly shield the sun’s energy.

From Science News For Students

Prevailing theories at the time supposed the sooty shearwaters got lost in the fog.

From Popular-Science

The black of her dress was a sooty black, but you would only have called her hair black because there was nothing else to call it.

From Project Gutenberg

It was an aged female that spoke; she sat on the ground all clad in a sooty garment.

From Project Gutenberg

Others, very dusty, came from beneath carpets, and lastly a sooty bundle was dragged down the chimney.

From Project Gutenberg

The “sooty-fox” is a variety of the “Arctic,” distinguished from it only by its colour, which is of a uniform blackish brown.

From Project Gutenberg

There are lots of mice in this kitchen—sooty mice, not clean like ours—and I thought I'd try to catch them.

From Project Gutenberg