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cholera

Etymology and origin of the English word cholera

History

Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ˈkɒləɹə/ (UK); /ˈkɑləɹə/ (US)[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin cholera,[2][3][4][5] partly through Middle French choléra,[6][3] from Ancient Greek χολέρα (kholéra, “a digestive disorder”),[2][6][3][5] from kholḗ “bile, gall”.[6][3] It was at first not distinguished from choler.[6][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Bile, one of the four humours (c. 1386), the same as choler.[7][3]

Semantic evolution

The Greek disease was a diarrhoea thought to be caused by bile.[3] English revived the classical sense in 1565–78 for a severe digestive disorder with bilious diarrhoea, vomiting and cramps, usually occurring in late summer and rarely fatal to adults.[7][3][6] From 1698 the word was applied to the deadly disease endemic in India,[7] also called cholera morbus (1704),[3][7] which broke out in worldwide epidemics, reaching Britain and America in the early 1830s.[3] Later it was extended to various diseases of domestic animals, such as chicken cholera (1882) and hog cholera.[7][2][8]

Timeline

  • c. 1386 – bile, choler (obsolete).[7]
  • 1565–78 – a bilious digestive disorder.[7][6]
  • 1698 – the epidemic disease of India.[7]
  • 1704 – cholera morbus.[7][3]
  • 1882 – chicken cholera.[7]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. An acute infectious disease of the small intestine, caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae and marked by profuse watery diarrhoea, vomiting, cramps and severe dehydration.
  2. Any of various diseases of domestic animals, such as chickens or hogs, marked by severe gastroenteritis.

Word family

  • choleraic
  • Asiatic cholera
  • chicken cholera
  • cholera infantum
  • cholera morbus
  • fowl cholera
  • hog cholera

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Harper, Douglas, Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  5. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  8. ^ Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary (1999), 2nd ed., New York: Random House

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Cholera.” Etymologically, 10 Oct. 2026, etymologically.com/en/cholera. Accessed 11 Oct. 2026.

Last edited on . ·