Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • intransitive verb To roast or calcine (crystals or salts) until they emit a crackling sound or stop crackling.
  • intransitive verb To make a crackling sound when roasted.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To crackle, as salt when roasting.
  • To roast or calcine in a strong heat, so as to cause a continual bursting or crackling of the substance: as, to decrepitate salt.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • intransitive verb To crackle, as salt in roasting.
  • transitive verb To roast or calcine so as to cause a crackling noise.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb transitive To roast (a salt or mineral) until it stops crackling in the fire.
  • verb intransitive Of salts and minerals, to crackle when heated, indicating a sudden breakdown of their particles.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb to roast or calcine so as to cause to crackle or until crackling stops
  • verb undergo decrepitation and crackle

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[New Latin dēcrepitāre, dēcrepitāt- : Latin dē-, de- + Latin crepitāre, to crackle, frequentative of crepāre, to burst, crack.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From mediaeval Latin decrepitare, from Latin de- + crepitare.

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Examples

  • The crystals are in the form of small cubes and contain no water of crystallization; some water is, however, held in cavities in the crystals and causes the salt to decrepitate when heated.

    An Elementary Study of Chemistry William McPherson

  • Heated to rednefs for half an hour, it does not decrepitate, but lofes 45 per ct. of its weight.

    Elements of Mineralogy: By Richard Kirwan, ... 1794

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