Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Infestation with lice, especially crab lice; pediculosis.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun The presence of lice on the body, with the irritation produced thereby and its effects; the lousy disease, formerly called
morbus pediculosus .
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Med.) A disease (
morbus pediculous ) consisting in the excessive multiplication of lice on the human body.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun medicine An
infestation withcrab lice - noun A
pediculosis
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
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Examples
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Schiödte, a Danish entomologist, has, it seems to us, forever settled the question as to whether the louse bites the flesh or sucks blood, and decides a point interesting to physicians, _i. e._, that the loathsome disease called phthiriasis is a nonentity.
Our Common Insects A Popular Account of the Insects of Our Fields, Forests, Gardens and Houses 1872
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Aeneas was dreadfully tossed and endangered by a storm; and perhaps for the same reason Herod, that tyrant and cruel King of Judaea, finding himself near the pangs of a horrid kind of death — for he died of a phthiriasis, devoured by vermin and lice; as before him died L. Sylla, Pherecydes the Syrian, the preceptor of
Five books of the lives, heroic deeds and sayings of Gargantua and his son Pantagruel 2002
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Aeneas was dreadfully tossed and endangered by a storm; and perhaps for the same reason Herod, that tyrant and cruel King of Judaea, finding himself near the pangs of a horrid kind of death — for he died of a phthiriasis, devoured by vermin and lice; as before him died L. Sylla, Pherecydes the Syrian, the preceptor of
Five books of the lives, heroic deeds and sayings of Gargantua and his son Pantagruel 2002
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Pediculosis: a state of lousiness, or the abnormal condition caused by the multiplication of lice on the body: sec phthiriasis.
Explanation of Terms Used in Entomology John. B. Smith
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“Sir,” said he, “had Wilkes's mob prevailed against government, this nation had died of phthiriasis.
Life of Johnson Boswell, James, 1740-1795 1887
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"Sir," said he, "had Wilkes's mob prevailed against government, this nation had died of _phthiriasis_.
Life of Johnson, Volume 3 1776-1780 James Boswell 1767
skipvia commented on the word phthiriasis
An infestation of crab lice.
October 18, 2007
yarb commented on the word phthiriasis
If only I'd known.
October 18, 2007
trivet commented on the word phthiriasis
*shiver*
October 18, 2007
hernesheir commented on the word phthiriasis
...the lousy disease... --from the definitions.
November 29, 2011