Quartan
adj, noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 A fever whose symptoms recur every four days. historical
"an Egyptian at Alexandria, whose quartan resisted the strongest applications of European physic, was effectually healed by the actual cautery, which a certain Arab Shaykh applied to the crown of his head."
- 2 a malarial fever that recurs every fourth day wordnet
- 1 Recurring every four days; especially in designating a form of malaria with such symptoms. not-comparable
"Pork, of all meats, is[…]naught for queasy stomachs, insomuch that frequent use of it may breed a quartan ague."
- 1 occurring every fourth day (especially the fever and weakness of malaria) wordnet
Example
More examples"an Egyptian at Alexandria, whose quartan resisted the strongest applications of European physic, was effectually healed by the actual cautery, which a certain Arab Shaykh applied to the crown of his head."
Etymology
From Anglo-Norman quartaine, Old French quartaine, from Latin quartāna (short for febris quartana), noun use of feminine form of quartānus (“recurring every four days”), from quartus (“fourth”).
More for "quartan"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.