spume

American  

[spyoom] / spyum /

verb (used with object)

spumed, spuming

1. to eject or discharge as or like foam or froth; spew (often followed byforth ).

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verb (used without object)

spumed, spuming

1. to foam; froth.

noun

1. foam, froth, or scum.

spume British  

/ spjuːm /

noun

1. foam or surf, esp on the sea; froth

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verb

1. (intr) to foam or froth

Other Word Forms

• spumous adjective
• spumy adjective

Etymology

Origin of spume

1300–50; Middle English < Latin spūma foam, froth; akin to foam

Example Sentences

The style Matthiessen conjures is almost visual, with fragments of scene description and lines of unattributed dialogue arranged on the page like solitary brushstrokes or like breakers of spume on the open sea.

From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 21, 2025

And with its evocations of cliffs, peaks, sails and spume, the building’s form relays a sympathetic message from the San Gabriel Mountains looming to the northeast to the surf at the city’s other end.

From Los Angeles Times • May 22, 2019

Dinosaurish creatures as big as skyscrapers do battle with equally gigantic robots on land and sea, pulverizing familiar cities and churning up geysers of spume.

From New York Times • Jul. 11, 2013

Water spouts from the shelf in sprightly arcs and churning gouts, filigree fountains and chugging spume, all immobilised in the flickering strobes.

From The Guardian • Jan. 28, 2013

In the western ocean it harried the sea flat, lifting water bodily out of water and carrying it as spume.

From "The Once and Future King" by T. H. White