aqua fortis

• aquafortis, A.F.

Learned borrowing from Latin aqua fortis (literally “strong water”).

aqua fortis (uncountable)

1. (inorganic chemistry, archaic) Nitric acid.
2. (alchemy) A corrosive liquor made of saltpeter, serving as a solvent for dissolving silver and all other metals except gold.
3. (dialectal, dated) Any strong and potentially dangerous alcoholic drink.
   • 1867 December 25, “Police Reports”, in New Orleans Picayune:

     this man’s whiskey ain’t Red Eye, it ain’t Chain Lightnin’ either, it’s regular Agur-forty, and there isn’t a man living can stand a glass and keep his senses.

   • 1871 September 9, “Occasional Notes”, in The Temperance Record, number 805, page 422:

     “Watkey” [vodka] is, in fact, aquafortis, and more injurious than any other spirit.

   • 1896, W. C. Brann, Brann, the Iconoclast, volume 1, page 390:

     Doubtless the drinking of liquor adds to the cost of our judiciary; doubtless it is responsible for some crime; but the question at issue is not one of liquor-drinking vs. teetotalism—it is a question of drinking licensed liquor or Prohibition aquafortis.

   • 1917, Harvard College Class of 1872: Tenth Report of the Secretary, page 97:

     Here’s to her health and to her offspring haughty —
     And let the toast be drunk in aqua forty.

   • 1990, Graham Masterton, Empress, page 166:

     I’m in the best of spirits, the very best! Nothing like a few glasses of agur-forty to make a man feel on top of the world!

• aqua regia

• aqua fortis on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

• James A. H. Murray et al., editors (1884–1928), “Aqua fortis”, in A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (Oxford English Dictionary), volume I (A–B), London: Clarendon Press, →OCLC, page 421, column 1.

From aqua (“water”) +‎ fortis (“strong”), for being a liquid capable of dissolving metals.

aqua fortis f (genitive aquae fortis); first declension

1. aqua fortis

   Coordinate term: aqua regia

   1. (alchemy) a saltpeter-water solution
   2. (archaic, chemistry) nitric acid

First-declension noun with a third-declension adjective.

• → English: aqua fortis (learned)