Outdated Disease Names: Identify the Illnesses That Affected Your Ancestors

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Decipher your ancestors' health maladies with these modern versions of archaic medical terms.

Did your ancestor suffer from King’s evil, St. Vitus dance, painter’s colic or—God forbid—bloody flux? If so, you may be conjuring up images of Great-great Grandpa suddenly coming down with a royal case of devilishness or bawling as he put a new coat of paint on the barn. But archaic medical terms have evolved since the days of yore.

Many old terms for diseases and ailments have been replaced by modern medical names. King’s evil, for example, is swollen neck glands (caused by tuberculosis). St. Vitus dance, sometimes called chorea or viper’s dance, was the term for nervous twitches. Painter’s colic, also known as Devonshire colic and dry bellyache, is lead poisoning. And bloody flux was another name for dysentery. To help you make sense of the ailments and diseases you find mentioned in your family medical records, here are some common antiquated terms and what they mean by today’s standards (keeping in mind that the diagnosis may not have been accurate):

ablepsia: blindness
acute angina: sore throat
apoplexy: paralyzed by stroke
bad blood, Lues disease, French or great pox: syphilis
Bethlehemite: mentally ill person
biliousness: jaundice caused by liver disease
black death, camp fever or ship’s fever: typhus
brain fever: meningitis
child bed fever: infection following childbirth
cholelithiasis: gall stones
congestive fever or chills: malaria
consumption, African consumption, lung sickness or galloping consumption: tuberculosis
coryza or catarrhal: cold or allergies
costiveness: constipation
croup: laryngitis, diphtheria or strep throat
dengue: infectious fever common in East Africa
dyspepsia: heartburn, indigestion or symptoms
falling sickness or caduceus: epilepsy
fatty liver: cirrhosis
green sickness or fever: anemia
grippe, grip or lagrippe: influenza (the flu)
infantile paralysis: polio
lumbago: back pain
lung or winter fever: pneumonia
mormal: gangrene
neuralgia: general term for discomfort (example: neuralgia in the head is a headache)
puerperal exhaustion: death due to childbirth
putrid fever, chin cough, bladder in throat, malignant sore throat or kruchhusten: diphtheria or whooping cough
quinsey: tonsillitis
screws: rheumatism
thrush or aphtha: childhood disease; spots on mouth, lips and throat

For more translations of old medical terms:

Cyndi’s List – Diseases and Medical Terms

If you would like an explanation of today’s medical terms, check out the Mayo Clinic’s glossary of Diseases and Conditions A-Z for definitions and pronunciations.