anti-perspirant adj.

word-forming element of Greek origin meaning "against, opposed to, opposite of, instead," shortened to ant- before vowels and -h-, from Old French anti- and directly from Latin anti-, from Greek anti (prep.) "over, against, opposite; instead, in the place of; as good as; at the price of; for the sake of; compared with; in opposition to; in return; counter-," from PIE *anti "against," also "in front of, before" (from root *ant- "front, forehead," with derivatives meaning "in front of, before"), which became anti- in Italian (hence antipasto) and French.

It is cognate with Sanskrit anti "over, against," and Old English and- (the first element in answer). A common compounding element in Greek, in some combinations it became anth- for euphonic reasons. It appears in some words in Middle English but was not commonly used in English word formations until modern times. In a few English words (anticipate, antique) it represents Latin ante.

In noun compounds where it has the sense of "opposed to, opposite" (Antichrist, anti-communist) the accent remains on the anti-; in adjectives where it retains its old prepositional sense "against, opposed to," the accent remains on the other element (anti-Christian, anti-slavery).

1640s, of a volatile liquid, "to evaporate through the pores" (intransitive), a back-formation from perspiration and in part from Latin perspirare "blow or breathe constantly," from per "through" (from PIE root *per- (1) "forward," hence "through") + spirare "to breathe, blow" (see spirit (n.)). The meaning "to sweat, to give out watery substance through the pores of the skin" (intransitive) is a polite usage attested from 1725. Medical men tried to maintain a distinction between "sensible" (sweat) and "insensible" perspiration:

[I]t is sufficient for common use to observe, that perspiration is that insensible discharge of vapour from the whole surface of the body and the lungs which is constantly going on in a healthy state; that it is always natural and always salutary; that sweat, on the contrary, is an evacuation, which never appears without some uncommon effort, or some disease to the system, that it weakens and relaxes, and is so far from coinciding with perspiration, that it obstructs and checks it. [Charles White, "A Treatise on the Management of Pregnant and Lying-in Women," London, 1791]

Related: Perspired; perspiring.

1848, "a deodorizer," originally of substances to quell the odor of manure, formed in English as if from de- + Latin odorantem, from odor "smell" (see odor (n.)). In reference to a substance to be used on the human body, from 1860. An earlier version, a perfumed powder, was called empasm (1650s), from Greek *empasma "to sprinkle on."