Incense

Beware the pronunciation of the homographs incense. There is a noun, and two verbs - one commoner currently than the other.

• The noun, which is uncountable, means a substance produced from various aromatic gums, which is burned for its smoke and smell. It is used in religious rituals, for purification or as an offering to God ('on high'), and at social occasions, sometimes in the form of 'joss sticks'. It is held to have a therapeutic effect. (Burning incense is associated with the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches, and some few Protestants who verge towards them: 'High' Anglicans, or 'Anglo-Catholics', are sometimes described as the 'bells and smells' wing of the Church.) For one particular type of incense, see frankincense.

The noun is pronounced with the stress on the first syllable: 'INN-sense', IPA: /'ɪn sɛns/.

• • The rarer of the two verbs 'to incense', which means 'to perfume or fumigate with smoke', 'to make pleasant smells by burning incense', is pronounced in the same way. The word has largely been replaced in present-day English]] by the aphetic 'to cense'. See also censer
• The more current verb 'to incense' means 'to make angry', 'to excite the rage [of]', 'to enrage'. In older forms of English, until well into the Early Modern period, one could incense any of the emotions; and before then, the verb could be used in its older, more literal sense: 'to set fire to'.

 This verb is pronounced with the stress on the second syllable: 'in-SENSE', IPA: /ɪn 'sɛns /.

Etymological note: All these different words ar derived from the Latin verb incendĕre 'to set on fire', and particularly its past participle incensus, 'set on fire', 'burning'.