hives, n. pl.
(haɪvz)
Also hyves.
[Origin uncertain. Usually connected with heave v., ‘because hives appear above the skin’ (Jamieson); but this derivation is difficult phonologically.]
‘Any eruption on the skin, when the disorder is supposed to proceed from an internal cause’ (Jam.); applied to red-gum or Strophulus, chicken-pox, nettle-rash; also, inflammation of the bowels or Enteritis (bowel-hives), and inflammation of the larynx, croup, or Laryngitis.
| c 1500 Roull's Cursing 47 in Laing Sel. Rem. Pop. Poetry Scot., Fflusix, hyvis, or huttit ill, Hoist, heidwark, or fawin ill. 1715 Bowel-hyve [see bowel n. 6]. 1754–64 Smellie Midwif., A child..struck out all over the body with small red eruptions: which in London the nurses call the red-gum, but in Scotland is termed the hives. 1825 Brockett, Hives, water-blebs, an eruption in the skin. 1886 Syd. Soc. Lex., Hives, a popular name for the globular species of Varicella, or chicken-pox..also, any skin eruption; also, a synonym of Urticaria; also, a name for Croup. 1893 Northumbld. Gloss., Hive, an inward feeling of enlargement. There are ‘chest hives’, ‘bowel hives’, etc., descriptive of an inward heaving or swelling. Hives are not usually outward eruptions, but when so they are commonly called het hives—hot heaves or hot spots. |
b. hive-syrup U.S., compound syrup of squills.
| 1839 Southern Lit. Messenger V. 65/2 There's nothing there but a few drops of peppermint,..and some of the patent hive-syrup. 1901 T. Sollmann Text-bk. Pharmacol. 612 Syrupus Scillæ Compositus (U.S.P.) (Hive Syrup)... Used especially in whooping-cough. 1936 Cook & LaWall Remington's Pract. Pharm. (ed. 8) 304 Syrupus Scillæ Compositus... Hive Syrup, Coxe's Hive Syrup. |