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bubonic plague

bubonic plague

11 6.7
A serious disease that spreads and causes fever and painful swollen glands
  • noun
  • /bjuːˈbɒnɪk pleɪɡ/
  • Specialized
translation icon : peste bubónica
  • The Black Death, a huge wave of epidemics of bubonic plague, spread across Europe during 1347-1353 CE.
  • bubonic plague outbreak

New research has shown that the bubonic plague might have selected adna variant that benefits certain autoimmune disorders.

Examples

  • But then in May, an outbreak of bubonic plague struck in the port of Marseilles.

  • A deadly bacterium called Yesenia pestis Procopius is at the centre of the world's first bubonic plague pandemic.

  • So nine years after this was painted, the bubonic plague hit much of Europe.

  • "In 1910, bubonic plague swept through mainland China.

  • In the 14th century, the rat carried the bubonic plague flea that killed one out of every three from India to Iceland.

  • In the sixth century A.D., rat fleas from Egypt spread bubonic plague into the Roman Empire, killing millions of people; some scholars say this vast epidemic brought on the Dark Ages.

    Academic text (2011)
  • In the 14th century, the bubonic plague killed one in three Europeans.

  • So nine years after this was painted, the bubonic plague hit much of Europe.

  • In the 1300s, the bubonic plague killed over 20% of the humans on the globe.

Synonyms

plague
vsbubonic plague
266 6.6

A very serious disease that spreads quickly and kills many people

is the specific form caused by one bacterium and marked by swollen lymph nodes
pestis bubonica
vsbubonic plague
  • Archaic
9.9

A serious disease causing fever and painful swollen glands spread by fleas from rats

is the same disease but named in everyday English rather than Latin
glandular plague
vsbubonic plague
  • Specialized
9.9

A common illness that causes fever and painful swollen glands in the armpits or groin

focuses on bacterial cause and wider historical epidemic role

Surface Forms

Morphology

bubonic + plague

This is a compositional adjective + noun phrase: 'bubonic' describes the type of 'plague', so knowing 'bubonic' (relating to buboes/symptoms) and 'plague' (infectious disease) allows a learner to infer it is the plague characterized by buboes. The relation is literal and subtype-forming rather than idiomatic, and similar descriptive patterns occur cross-linguistically, making the meaning derivable from the parts.

Etymology

The name bubonic plague comes from the painful, swollen lumps called buboes that appear on the body, often in the groin or armpit. People named the illness after that clear sign, so 'bubonic plague' today means the serious 'disease' with those swollen glands.