Definition

1. Noun:
   • Miasma: A noxious or poisonous atmosphere, formerly believed to be a vapor filled with particles from decomposed matter, causing disease and prevalent in swampy or mountainous forest regions.
   • Malaria: In traditional Vietnamese belief and historical context, "lam chướng" often specifically referred to the bad air thought to cause malarial fevers in jungle and mountainous areas.

Usage Examples

• Noun:
  • Vùng rừng núi này có nhiều lam chướng. (This mountainous forest region has a lot of miasma.)
  • Theo kinh nghiệm dân gian, cần tránh lam chướng để khỏi bệnh. (According to folk experience, one must avoid miasma to stay healthy.)

Advanced Usage

• The term is deeply rooted in traditional East Asian and Vietnamese medicine and cosmology, which attributed epidemics and fevers to poisonous vapors ("khí độc") from the earth and decaying matter, rather than microbial transmission.

Variants and Related Words

• Chướng khí (n): Another term for noxious air or miasma, often used interchangeably with "lam chướng."
  • Người xưa sợ chướng khí vùng sơn lam. (People in the past feared the miasma of the mountainous forests.)

Synonyms

• Miasma: Noxious, disease-causing air.
• Malaria: (In historical/folk context) The disease attributed to such air.
• Pestilential air: Air believed to carry plague or disease.

Related Idioms

• Sơn lam chướng khí: A classical four-word idiom describing remote, wild, and unhealthy mountainous jungle regions.
  • Họ phải vượt qua vùng sơn lam chướng khí. (They had to traverse the unhealthy mountainous jungle region.)

noun

1. miasma