1. A thin oil distilled from petroleum or shale oil, used as a fuel for heating and cooking, in lamps, and as a denaturant for alcohol.

Also called coal oil, lamp oil. 2. Etymology: from 1852, coined in Canada by Abraham Gesner, who discovered how to distill it about 1846, from Greek keros, "wax" + chemical suffix -ene. So called because it contains paraffin.