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prettygoodwordcalenture (KAL-uhn-cher) - n., a tropic fever formerly believed to be caused by the heat; generically, heat exhaustion or heatstroke; a burning passion or zeal.
It's now generally thought that the former fever, and its attendant deliriums, were forms of heat illness, rather than a separate disease. For uses and descriptions, see for example Gulliver's Travels and Robinson Crusoe. Borrowed around 1582 either through French calenture or directly from Spanish calentura, both this disease and fever, from calentar, to heat, from the present participle of Latin calēre, to be hot.
And that ends this week's stealth theme of c-words. I'd snicker at doing that, but it's too danged hot here.
---L.
It's now generally thought that the former fever, and its attendant deliriums, were forms of heat illness, rather than a separate disease. For uses and descriptions, see for example Gulliver's Travels and Robinson Crusoe. Borrowed around 1582 either through French calenture or directly from Spanish calentura, both this disease and fever, from calentar, to heat, from the present participle of Latin calēre, to be hot.
And that ends this week's stealth theme of c-words. I'd snicker at doing that, but it's too danged hot here.
---L.
