fever

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ˈfiːvə/ (UK); /ˈfivɚ/ (US)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old English fēfor, fēfer, borrowed from Latin febris (“fever”),^[2][3][4][5] reinforced in Middle English by Anglo-Norman fevre, Old French fievre.^[4][6][7] The Latin word is related to fovēre (“to warm”),^[2][3][5] perhaps from PIE Proto-Indo-European *dhegh- (“to burn”).^[3] It was taken into most Germanic languages, as German Fieber.^[3][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

A disease marked by high body temperature: about 1000 in Barnhart and the OED.^[2][8]

Semantic evolution

Old English also had hriþ for fever,^[3] and the verb feferian.^[3] Intense nervous excitement or agitation, as a fever of impatience, is from 1586, the 1580s in Etymonline.^[8][3] Fever ague (1338) translated Old French fievre ague, acute fever.^[8] Feverish meant causing fever before 1398 and excited, restless from 1634, in Milton.^[2] The verb, to throw into a fever, is from 1606 in MWU.^[5] Word Origins notes that the plant feverfew was a traditional cure, from Latin febrifugia.^[9]

Timeline

• c. 1000 – a fever.^[2][8]
• 1338 – fever ague.^[8]
• 1586 – intense excitement.^[8]
• 1634 – feverish, restless.^[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. An abnormally high body temperature, usually with shivering and headache.
2. Any of various diseases marked by fever: yellow fever.
3. A state of nervous excitement or agitation: a fever of anticipation.

Word family

• feverless
• feverweed
• enfever
• feverish
• feverous
• feverroot
• feverwort
• brain fever

Related words

• fever blister
• fever pitch
• fever therapy
• fever tree
• fever twig
• febrile
• fervent
• fervid
• fervor
• feverfew

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
3. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d e f Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press