Definition of "ichor"

(Greek mythology) The liquid said to flow in place of blood in the veins of the gods.  quotations

(by extension)

1. (chiefly poetic) The blood of human beings or animals; also (obsolete) the clear, fluid portion of blood; blood plasma, plasma.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • He had merely meant to express his feeling that the streams which ran through their veins were not yet purified by time to that perfection, had not become so genuine an ichor, as to be worthy of being called blood in the genealogical sense.

     1857, Anthony Trollope, “The Thornes of Ullathorne”, in Barchester Towers. […], copyright edition, volume I, Leipzig: Bernhard Tauchnitz, published 1859, page 266

2. (chiefly poetic, figuratively) A blood-like fluid.  quotations  examples

   Quotations

   • [I]chores and thoſe ſerious matters being thickned become flegme, and flegme degenerates into choler, choler aduſt becomes æruginoſa melancholia, as vinegar out of the pureſt wine putrified or by exhalation of purer ſpirits is ſo made, and becomes ſowre and ſharp; […]

     1638, Democritus Junior , page 34

   • Go bring him [an ant] home to his people. / Lay him in state on a sepal. / Wrap him for shroud in a petal. / Embalm him with ichor of nettle.

     1936, Robert Frost, “Departmental”, in The Poems of Robert Frost: […], New York, N.Y.: The Modern Library, published 1946, page 331

   • They will not live / As shades but angle forward to enjoy / The pluck of life, the pressure of their ichor.

     1988, Peter Porter, “They Come Back More”, in Quadrant, volume 32, Sydney, N.S.W.: Quadrant Magazine, page 29, column 2

   • Like snow fall you cry a silent storm. / Your tears paint rivers on this oaken wall / Amber nectar / misery ichor.

     2002 August 13, “You Were But a Ghost in My Arms”, in John Haughm (lyrics), John Haughm, Don Anderson, and Jason William Walton (music), The Mantle, performed by Agalloch

3. (geology, archaic) A fluid believed to seep out from magma and cause rock to turn into granite.

4. (pathology, obsolete) A fetid, watery discharge from a sore; pus.