In 1626 in a guide for young seamen, the English captain and explorer John Smith (1580-1631) recorded the first use of the word breeze in a list of winds in order of their severity.
These included a calm, a breeze, a gale, a gust, a storm, a spout, a tornado, a monsoon, and a hurricane.
Captain Smith spelled breeze as “brese” and had taken it from the Spanish word “briza”, meaning a light wind.
