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In the upper reaches of Chomolungma, known more familiarly as Mount Everest, the air is so rarefied—so much less dense than at lower elevations—that most climbers use supplemental oxygen in order to successfully complete their climb. This sense of rarefied, a word that comes from a combination of the Latin words rarus (“thin” or “rare”) and facere (“to make”), has been in use since the 1500s. A second, figurative sense of rarefied developed in the following century to describe things that can only be understood by a small or select group, i.e. one “thinned” from the majority of people by dint of their unique experience, expertise, or status. It’s this sense that we use when we say that to successfully summit Chomolungma puts one in rarefied company—just over 6,000 people have made it to the top at the time of this writing.
Examples of rarefied in a Sentence
Alexandra Kirkman, Fortune, 18 June 2025
The result is a serene space that exemplifies a rarefied lifestyle, somewhere between the Tate Modern and mid-century Milan.
—Abby Montanez, Robb Report, 12 June 2025
This novel—a whodunit, a coming-of-age, a New York novel—heralds the arrival of a rarefied talent.
—Gabrielle Bellot, Literary Hub, 10 June 2025
Interplanetary space is far more rarefied, with just a few dozen particles in each cubic centimeter.
—Phil Plait, Scientific American, 25 Apr. 2025
See All Example Sentences for rarefied
Cite this Entry
“Rarefied.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/rarefied. Accessed 30 Jun. 2025.
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