rum nose
- noun
- Archaic
:
nariz de borracho
- His rum nose was a telltale sign of years spent drinking at the local pub.
Examples
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Doctors now know a rum nose can result from rosacea, not just alcohol abuse.
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People used to believe that a rum nose meant someone was a heavy drinker.
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He has a noticeable rum nose from years of drinking.
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Many people associate a rum nose with heavy drinking.
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His rum nose was a clear indication of his long-term alcohol consumption.
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Many people recognize a rum nose as a sign of excessive drinking over the years.
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After many nights of partying, he developed a pronounced rum nose that was hard to ignore.
Synonyms
A large red nose with visible small blood vessels often caused by heavy drinking
A red, swollen nose with small veins you can see after long heavy drinking
A nose that becomes large and red with visible veins from long heavy drinking
A red, swollen nose with small broken veins, often from heavy drinking
An enlarged red nose with visible blood vessels that often comes from heavy drinking
A large red round nose with small red lines from blood vessels
How Red
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase is a straightforward attributive compound: a learner who knows 'rum' (the alcoholic drink) and 'nose' can infer it refers to a nose associated with alcohol. However, the precise clinical image — a reddish, enlarged nose with visible blood vessels linked to heavy drinking — is a specialized, culture-specific extension not fully predictable from the constituents, so the transparency is partial.
Etymology
Rum nose may come from an old, simple picture: people saw that men who drank a lot of rum often had a red, swollen nose, so the phrase came to mean a nose that shows heavy drinking. That's why rum nose means a reddish, enlarged nose often thought to show a 'heavy drinker'.