noun ·Moderate ·High school level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   A viral infection, caused by Human alphaherpesvirus 1 and Human alphaherpesvirus 2, marked by painful, watery blisters in the skin or in the mucous membranes or on the genitals. countable, uncountable

   "This, of course, is something only people with that STI would know. For example, herpes is 437737."

2. 2
   any of the animal viruses that cause painful blisters on the skin wordnet
3. 3
   viral diseases causing eruptions of the skin or mucous membrane wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms

herpes simplexacneacne vulgarisacute articular rheumatismafrican lethargyague

Example

More examples

"Male circumcision decreases the risk of viral infections that cause herpes and cancer."

Etymology

From Latin herpēs, from Ancient Greek ἕρπης (hérpēs, “herpes”, literally “a creeping”), from ἕρπειν (hérpein, “to creep”).

Related phrases

genital herpesherpes anginaherpes gladiatorumherpes simplex virusherpes tonsuransspace herpesherpes zoster

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.