apoplexy
(ˈæpəʊplɛksɪ)
Forms: 4–7 apoplexie (4–5 poplexie, 6 poplesye), 7– apoplexy.
[a. Fr. apoplexie, ad. L. apoplēxia (occas. used in Eng.), a. Gr. ἀποπληξία name of the same malady, f. ἀποπλήσσ-ειν to disable by a stroke, f. ἀπό off, (in comb.) completely + πλήσσ-ειν to strike.]
1. A malady, very sudden in its attack, which arrests more or less completely the powers of sense and motion; it is usually caused by an effusion of blood or serum in the brain, and preceded by giddiness, partial loss of muscular power, etc.
| c 1386 Chaucer Nun's Pr. T. 21 Napoplexie [v.r. nepoplexie] ne shente nat hir heed. 1398 Trevisa Barth. De P.R. iii. xv. (1495) 59 Apoplexia is a euyll that makith a man lese all maner feling. 1552 Lyndesay Monarche iv. 5117 Sum ar dissoluit suddantlye Be Cattarue or be Poplesye. 1597 Shakes. 2 Hen. IV, i. ii. 126 This Apoplexie is (as I take it) a kind of Lethargie, a sleeping of the blood, a horson Tingling. 1748 Thomson Cast. Indol. lxxvii. 692 Whilst Apoplexy cramm'd Intemperance knocks Down to the ground at once, as butcher felleth ox. 1861 Hulme Moquin-Tandon i. ii. 11 Frequent apoplexies would be the result. |
b. in Falconry.
| 1614 Markham Cheape Hvsb. (1623) 163 The Apoplexie or falling euill in Hawkes. 1725 Bradley Fam. Dict., Apoplexy..a Disease that seizes the Heads of Hawks, commonly by reason of two much Grease and Store of Blood. |
2. transf. or fig.
| 1589 Pasquil's Return B iiij b, His disease is the very Apoplexie of the Donatistes. 1678 Yng. Man's Call. 52 Foolishness: it is the souls apoplexy, wherein all the noble faculties of the mind are cast into a dead sleep. 1866 Motley Dutch Rep. vi. iii. 824 The country was without a centre. There was small chance of apoplexy where there was no head. |
3. Also applied by some to the effusion of blood in other organs.
| 1853 Mayne Exp. Lex., Apoplexy cutaneous, a singular term employed by certain French writers for a great and sudden determination of blood to the skin. 1880 Syd. Soc. Lex., Apoplexy retinal, effusion of blood in the retina from rupture of its vessels. |