Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A disease caused by a deficiency of niacin and protein in the diet and characterized by skin eruptions, digestive and nervous system disturbances, and eventual mental deterioration.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. An endemic disease of southern Europe, characterized by erythema, digestive derangement, and nervous affections. It exhibits vernal recurrences or exacerbations, and is frequently fatal after a few years. Also spelled pelagra.
Wiktionary
- n. pathology A disease, with skin lesions and mental confusion, primarily caused by a niacin deficiency.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. (Med.) An affection of the skin, characterized by redness, especially in exposed areas, scaling and shedding of the skin, and accompanied with severe gastrointestinal disturbance and nervous symptoms. It is due to a deficiency of niacin (vitamin B3; nicotinic acid) and protein in the diet, and may be caused by malnutrition, or, in some cases, by a heavy dependence on maize for food. It was at one time (ca. 1890) endemic in Northern Italy, and was called
Alpine scurvy . It may also be caused by alcoholism or diease causing an impairment of nutrition. It is also calledSt. Ignatius's itch ,maidism ,mal de la rosa ,mal rosso , andpsychoneurosis maidica . A variety ofpellagra seen in children is called infantile pellagra or kwashiorkor.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a disease caused by deficiency of niacin or tryptophan (or by a defect in the metabolic conversion of tryptophan to niacin); characterized by gastrointestinal disturbances and erythema and nervous or mental disorders; may be caused by malnutrition or alcoholism or other nutritional impairments
Etymologies
- From Italian pelle ("skin") + agra ("sour") (Wiktionary)
- Italian : pelle, skin (from Latin pellis) + -agra, a seizure (from Latin, from Greek -agrā, from agrā, a seizing). (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“So you think a lot of what they called pellagra might a been something else.”
“Do you ever remember people having this disease they call pellagra?”
“Likewise in pellagra the gastro-intestinal symptoms are responsive.”
“A different deficiency disease called pellagra struck the rural poor in Europe and the southern United States in the 18th and 19th centuries, when they adopted corn from Central and South America as a staple food, but without the processing method cooking in alkaline water that makes its stores of niacin available to the human body.”
Simon & Schuster: On Food and Cooking, The Science and Lore of the Kitchen
“Tuttle says Jake must be mistaken because the pellagra is a kind of a”
“_ -- It is known that a very curious and fatal disease called pellagra is prevalent to a considerable degree at the present time in the United States, and it is not going too far to say that all of those best capable of judging are of the opinion that the malady is the result of eating just such corn as we know kills horses.”
“At that time, a disease called pellagra, characterized by cracked, scaly, discolored skin, digestive problems, and overall bodily weakness was increasingly prevalent in the southern region of the country.”
“Deficiency results in a condition called pellagra, the symptoms of which are a dark, scaly skin rash, a bright red tongue, vomiting, diarrhea, apathy, depression, disorientation, and memory loss.”
“Further, he supposed that, just as all the constituents of proteins (i.e. amino acids) belong to the same chemical class, so would the organic trace nutrients whose deficiencies were being envisioned as the causes of diseases such as pellagra and scurvy, in addition to beriberi.”
“There are reports of a cholera outbreak in the prisons with prisoners suffering from skin diseases such as pellagra and respiratory infections.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘pellagra’.
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Logolepsy
"Luciferous Logolepsy is a collection of over 9,000 obscure English words. Though the definition of an 'English' word might seem to be straightforward, it is not. There exist so many adopted, deriv...
Anschauung, Areopagus, Argus, Briarean, Dei gratia, Dei judicium, Deo volente, Duecento, Foehn, Geflugelte Worte, Gegenschein, Hakenkreuz and 9230 more...
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diseases that make lovely baby girl's...
usually i try to restrict this to sexually transmitted diseases, but some of the others are just so musical. Syphilis, it should be noted, would make a lovely boy's name, but that is outside the sc...
gonorrhea, chlamydia, roseola, rubella, angina, atrophy, candida, cholera, jaundice, palsy, leukemia, alopecia and 50 more...
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Worse Than They Sound
fistula, cryptosporidium, debride, donnybrook, decerebrate, pillory, flagellate, disembogue, minatory, micturate, coprolite, nosocomial and 160 more...
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to be sorted
litter, palanquin, aver, catamite, phlox, pliant, modicum, poorthink, cow, decalogue, caveat, dais and 175 more...
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botello360's list
ruminate, steel, bifurcation, arrivederci, portage, tactile, ruminant, rift, anecdotage, diacritic, cud, hull and 399 more...
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The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter
Words gatherd while reading The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers.
eiderdown, sowbelly, shambling, linthead, bohunk, lingeringly, undervest, rosette, scroughe, gramophone, nair, tousle and 28 more...
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moving driving words
act, active, actor, actual, actuary, actuate, agendum, agent, agile, agitate, allege, ambage and 47 more...
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CEPetty's list
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Pleasure Reading Words
sup
adobe, ingot, astrolabe, caladium, cassava, pellagra, bichloride, alembic, hermetic, ephemerality
Tweets
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