Meaning of "a certain air of"


What does "a certain air of" mean? I met it in the Chapter 3 of "A Study in Scarlet" by sir A. C. Doyle:



He was a man with some amount of self-importance and a certain air of command.




Answer



It means to exude an impression of command. You know, some people just give off a feeling that they are a certain way. It is not always a tangible thing that you can point to, it is often a mixture of obvious confidence and how they present themselves, and sometimes you pick up subconscious clues from how others around that person are deferring to them. But you just get a feeling that this person is a certain way - in this case of being a leader.


The flip side to that is the phrase "putting on airs" which is a derogatory term that a person is acting superior when they are not.


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