recrudescence

English
WOTD – 27 April 2019

Etymology

From Late Latin recrudescentia, from Latin recrūdēscēns, present participle of recrūdēscere (“to recrudesce”), from recrūdēscō (“to become raw again”); from re- (“again”) + crūdēscō (“to grow harsh or violent; to become worse”) (from crūdus (“bleeding, bloody, raw”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *krewh₂- (“blood outside the body”)) + -ēscō (suffix forming verbs indicating a becoming of something)). The word is cognate with French recrudescence, Italian recrudescenza, Spanish recrudescencia, recrudecimiento.[1]

Pronunciation

Noun

recrudescence (countable and uncountable, plural recrudescences)

  1. The condition or state being recrudescent; the condition of something (often undesirable) breaking out again, or re-emerging after temporary abatement or suppression. [from mid 17th c.]
    Synonyms: recrudency (archaic), reincrudation (obsolete)
    • 1887, Duke of Argyll [i.e., George Campbell, 8th Duke of Argyll], “The Age of Covenants”, in Scotland as It Was and as It Is, 2nd edition, Edinburgh: David Douglas, OCLC 1061880144, page 134:
      The population of particular countries, or districts of country, may be given up to less improving pursuits than those of agriculture. A recrudescence of barbarism may condemn it [i.e., land] to chronic poverty and waste.
    • 1996 spring, Albert E. Gunn; George O. Zenner, Jr., “Religious Discrimination in the Selection of Medical Students: A Case Study”, in Issues in Law and Medicine, volume 11, number 4, Terre Haute, Ind.: National Legal Center for the Medically Dependent & Disabled and the Horatio R. Storer Foundation, ISSN 8756-8160, OCLC 1081170257, PMID 8934858, pages 363–378; republished in The Linacre Quarterly: Journal of the Catholic Medical Association, volume 63, number 3, Wynnewood, Pa.: Catholic Medical Association, August 1996, DOI:10.1080/20508549.1999.11878356, ISSN 0024-3639, OCLC 1588532, page 52:
      Of course, bad habits die hard, and even with the new policy there were recrudescences of the prior practices in the following years.
    • 2015, James U. Van Dyke, “Cues for Reproduction in Squamate Reptiles”, in Justin L. Rheubert, Dustin S. Siegel, and Stanley E. Trauth, editors, Reproductive Biology and Phylogeny of Lizards and Tuatara (Reproductive Biology and Phylogeny; 10), Boca Raton, Fla.: CRC Press, →ISBN, page 119:
      High serum melatonin concentrations generally suppress reproduction in male squamates. Pinealectomy, which eliminates most melatonin secretion, induces testicular recrudescence in male green anoles, Anolis carolinensis, in autumn, but not in summer […]. Injected melatonin does not inhibit testicular recrudescence in pinealectomized males, but does so in intact males […].
  2. (medicine, by extension) The acute recurrence of a disease, or its symptoms, after a period of improvement.
    • 1754, J[ames] Kirkpatrick, “Section II. Of the Variolous Fuel, or Internal Inherent Cause of the Small Pox.”, in The Analysis of Inoculation: Comprizing the History, Theory, and Practice of It: With an Occasional Consideration of the Most Remarkable Appearances in the Small Pox, London: Printed for J. Millan, […]; J[ames] Buckland, […]; and R[alph] Griffiths, […], OCLC 723469781, page 34:
      Very probably however, ſuppoſing Mr. Dwight's Account to be Fact, not more than one Conſtitution in one Million is liable to ſuch repeated and diſtant Recrudeſcences of this Diſeaſe.
    • 1833, J. L. Bardsley, “HYDROPHOBIA”, in John Forbes, Alexander Tweedie, and John Conolly, editors, The Cyclopædia of Practical Medicine; […], volume II (EME–ISC), London: Sherwood, Gilbert, and Piper; Baldwin and Cradock, […]; Whittaker, Treacher, and Co., […], OCLC 1012799552, page 484, column 1:
      In other cases the wound opens of itself, and discharges a peculiar matter. Something similar is known to take place in traumatic tetanus; and although in this affection, as well as in hydrophobia, we cannot explain why the phenomenon of recrudescence does not occur in many fatal examples, yet we ought not therefore to deny that in those cases in which it does appear, the connexion between the recrudescence and the disease is most remarkable.
    • 1877, Charles Alexander Gordon, “Recurring Epidemics; Recrudescence”, in Notes on the Hygiene of Cholera for Ready Reference, London: Bailliere, Tindall, & Cox; Madras: Gantz Brothers, […]; Bombay; Calcutta: Thacker & Co., OCLC 14858340, paragraph 5, page 10:
      It becomes very difficult under many circumstances to distinguish between an epidemic solely due to recrudescence of the cholera principle retained from previous outbreak, and an epidemic the result of fresh introduction.
  3. (botany) The production of a fresh shoot from a ripened spike.
    • [1869, Maxwell T[ylden] Masters, “Prolification”, in Vegetable Teratology, an Account of the Principal Deviations from the Usual Construction of Plants (Ray Society; XLV), London: Published for the Ray Society by Robert Hardwicke, […], OCLC 982524630, book I (Deviations from Ordinary Arrangement), part III (Alterations of Position), page 104:
      [Frédéric] Kirschleger describes a tuft of leaves as occuring on the apex of the flowering spike after the maturation of the fruit in Plantago, and a similar growth frequently takes place in the common wallflower, in Antirrhinum majus, &c. In cases where a renewal of growth in the axis of inflorescence has taken place after the ripening of the fruit, the French botanists use the term recrudescence, but the growth in question by no means always occurs after the ripening of the fruit, but frequently before.]
    • 1872, Robert Holland, “Monstrous Plants in 1872”, in J[ohn] E[llor] Taylor, editor, Hardwicke’s Science-Gossip: An Illustrated Medium of Interchange and Gossip for Students and Lovers of Nature, volume VIII, number 96, London: Robert Hardwicke, […], published 1873, OCLC 1041007845, page 271, column 1:
      A great many of the scapes have furnished examples of "recrudescence," a few flowers having been produced amongst the ripening capsules; but fresh flower-stalks have also continued to shoot up from the root, and at the time I write (Oct. 4) I see there is one very pretty bunch of flowers upon a last year's seedling plant.

Hypernyms

Translations

References
  1. “recrudescence, n.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, June 2009; “recrudescence” in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press.

Further reading

French

Pronunciation

IPA(key): /ʁə.kʁy.dɛ.sɑ̃s/

Noun

recrudescence f (plural recrudescences)

  1. recrudescence
  2. an instance of recrudescence

Further reading
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