prettygoodword (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
prettygoodword) wrote2012-10-18 07:09 am
prettygoodword) wrote2012-10-18 07:09 am
phthisis
phthisis (THEY-sis, TEY-sis) - n., a wasting away of the body (or part of the body), esp. (obs.) pulmonary tuberculosis.
Now rare in the first sense, and completely obsolete in the consumptive sense -- though the adjectival phthisic still survives as a rare synonym for asthmatic. Borrowed around 1520 from medical Greek phthÃsis, lung disease, especially in particular TB, from phthÃein, to decay + a noun ending.
---L.
Now rare in the first sense, and completely obsolete in the consumptive sense -- though the adjectival phthisic still survives as a rare synonym for asthmatic. Borrowed around 1520 from medical Greek phthÃsis, lung disease, especially in particular TB, from phthÃein, to decay + a noun ending.
---L.