quarantine English · revision 4

+ ==Etymology==

+ In the sense “period of isolation for a ship suspected of carrying disease”, recorded from the 1660s,^(Etymonline) [[bor|it|quarantina]],^(AHD)^(RHWU) from Italian ''quaranta giorni'' “space of forty days”,^(Etymonline) [[der|it|quaranta|t=forty]],^(AHD)^(OED 1989) [[der|la|quadrāgintā|t=forty]].^(AHD)^(RHWU) The name comes from the Venetian policy, first enforced in 1377, of holding ships from plague-stricken countries off port for 40 days.^(Etymonline) Merriam-Webster traces the word partly also to [[fr|quarantaine]].^(MW Collegiate)

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+ An earlier, separate sense goes back to [[la-med|quarentēna]];^(OED 1989) as ''quarentyne'' (15th century) it named the desert in which Christ fasted for forty days.^(Etymonline)^(OED 1989)

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+ ==References==

+ {{reflist}}