inflammation

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English inflammacioun,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Latin inflammātiō (“a kindling, a setting on fire”),^[5][2][6][7] perhaps partly through Old French inflammation,^[2][3][8] which Littré records from the 14th century in the medical sense.^[5] The Latin noun of action is formed on inflammātus, the past participle of inflammō (“to set on fire, kindle”),^[6][7][2] from in- (“in”) and flammō (“to flame”), from flamma (“flame”).^[2][9] It is the noun of inflame.^[2][8]

Earliest recorded meaning

In medicine, a condition of a part of the body marked by heat, swelling and redness: before 1425, in a translation of Guy de Chauliac's Grande Chirurgie,^[3][4][2] where it is used of the skin.^[4] The OED's first quotation, in this sense, is from Elyot's Castel of Helthe of 1541.^[5]

Semantic evolution

English took the medical sense first; the literal Latin sense, setting on fire or being in flames, appears only in the 1560s,^[2][5] first in Fulke's book on meteors (1563), which also used an inflammation for a blazing object, a sense lost by the late 18th century.^[5][8] Johnson (1755) still put the senses "the act of setting on flame" and "the state of being in flame" first.^[10] From 1597, in Hooker, it was used of a kindling of devotion, and since 1600, in Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 2, of the inflaming of the mind and passions;^[5] Byron used it once (1821) for an increase in a price or charge.^[5] The medical sense is now the main one: a local reaction of living tissue to injury or infection.^[11][7][12]

Timeline

• before 1425 – an inflamed condition of the skin or body, in a translation of Chauliac.^[3][4]
• 1541 – in pathology, a diseased condition with heat, swelling, pain and redness.^[5]
• 1563 – setting on fire, being in flames; also a blazing body (obsolete after 1772).^[5]
• 1597 – an incitement, a kindling of devotion (obsolete).^[5]
• 1600 – the inflaming of the mind or passions.^[5]
• 1821 – an increase in a price or charge (obsolete).^[5]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. (medicine) A local reaction of the body's tissue to injury or infection, usually with redness, heat, swelling and pain: The cream reduced the inflammation around the bite.
2. The act of inflaming or setting on fire, or the state of being inflamed.
3. The rousing of strong emotions or passions, or the state of being so roused.

Related words

• flammability
• flammable
• inflammable
• inflammatory
• inflame
• flame

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c d Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
8. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
10. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
11. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
12. ^ Stedman's Medical Dictionary, Baltimore: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins