transpire

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
transpire/tranˈspʌɪə(r)/

▶verb

• 1 (usu. it transpires) come to be known; prove to be so.

• 2 happen.

• 3 Botany (of a plant or leaf) give off water vapour through the stomata.

– derivatives
transpiration noun.

– origin ME: from Fr. transpirer or med. L. transpirare, from L. trans- ‘through’ + spirare ‘breathe’.

usage: The standard sense of transpire is ‘come to be known’ (it transpired that he had bought a house). From this, a looser sense developed in US English in the late 18th century, meaning ‘happen’ (I'm going to find out exactly what transpired). This newer sense is very common, but is sometimes criticized for being an unnecessarily long word used where occur and happen would do just as well.