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calenture

[kal-uh n-cher, -choo r]
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noun
  1. Pathology. a violent fever with delirium, affecting persons in the tropics.
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Origin of calenture

1585–95; earlier calentura < Spanish: fever, equivalent to calent(ar) to heat (< Latin calent-, stem of calēns, present participle of calēre to be hot) + -ura -ure
Related formscal·en·tu·ral, cal·en·tu·rish, adjective
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018

Examples from the Web for calenture

Historical Examples

  • They presently catch fever, or a calenture, or a cramp, and so they die.

    For Faith and Freedom

    Walter Besant

  • But who will judge a man's constitution by the symptoms of calenture?

  • A new world seemed to open before her longing gaze—a world, or a calenture, a mirage?

    Robert Falconer

    George MacDonald

  • The evidence relative to yellow fever, or calenture, during this period in Virginia is contradictory.

  • Calenture, kal′en-tūr, n. a kind of fever or delirium occurring on board ship in hot climates.

British Dictionary definitions for calenture

calenture

noun
  1. a mild fever of tropical climates, similar in its symptoms to sunstroke
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Word Origin

C16: from Spanish calentura fever, ultimately from Latin calēre to be warm
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012