Other forms: torrents
A torrent is a violent rushing stream, or a flood of words. A mountain torrent, a torrent of abuse, rain came down in torrents.
The figurative use is the commoner one: a torrent of abuse or of questions is more than anybody can answer. The Latin behind it means boiling, from the look of white water rather than from any heat.
1nountorrentA violent rushing stream, or a flood of words.
“After the storm, the little stream became a raging torrent.”
torrent is a flow.
Latin torrens means boiling or roaring, from torrere, to burn, from the look of white water.
Proto-Indo-European
*ters-
Latin
torrentem
Italian
torrente
French
torrent
English, today
torrent
Built from
Borrowed from French torrent, from Italian torrente, from Latin torrentem, accusative of torrēns (“burning, seething, roaring”), from Latin torrēre (“to parch, scorch”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA