kind of ice cream dessert, 1929, from Italian spumone (singular), spumoni (plural), from spuma "foam" (see spume).
1570s, "an act of assistance," from assist (v.). In the sporting sense attested 1877 in baseball, 1925 in ice hockey.
"white line of ice crystals behind an airplane in motion," 1945, from condensation trail (1942); see condensation.
"substance used to make a glossy coating," 1784, from glaze (v.). In reference to a thin coating of ice from 1752.
1650s, "cold, icy," from French glacial or directly from Latin glacialis "icy, frozen, full of ice," from glacies "ice," probably from a suffixed form of PIE root *gel- "cold; to freeze" (source also of Latin gelu "frost"). Geological sense "pertaining to glaciers" apparently was coined in 1846 by British naturalist Edward Forbes (1815-1854). Hence figurative sense "at an extremely slow rate," as of the advance of glaciers. Related: Glacially.
"disaster," 1848, from French débâcle "downfall, collapse, disaster" (17c.), a figurative use, literally "breaking up (of ice on a river) in consequence of a rise in the water," extended to the violent flood that follows when the river ice melts in spring; from débâcler "to free," earlier desbacler "to unbar," from des- "off" (see dis-) + bacler "to bar," from Vulgar Latin *bacculare, from Latin baculum "stick" (see bacillus).
The literal sense is attested in English from 1802, in geology, to explain the landscapes left by the ice ages. Figurative sense of "disaster" was present in French before English borrowed the word.
"frozen ice mix with a wooden stick inserted to serve as a handle," 1923, trademark name registered by Frank Epperson of Oakland, Calif., presumably from (lolly)pop + (ic)icle.
