contagious, a.
(kənˈteɪdʒəs)
[ME. a. OF. contagieus (14th c.), ad. (late) L. contāgiōsus, f. contāgiōn-: see contagion and -ous.]
I. Where the notion of mutual contact is present.
1. Of the nature of or characterized by contagion; communicating disease or corruption by contact; infectious. Also fig.
| c 1374 Chaucer Boeth. iii. xii. 101 Whan I lost my memorie by þe contagious coniunccioun of þe body wiþ þe soule. 1607 T. Walkington Opt. Glass ii. (1664) 23 His Soul must needs be affected with the Contagious Qualities incident unto his Body. 1795 Southey Joan of Arc vii. 451 Ere the contagious vices of the court Polluted her, he thought. 1835 Ure Philos. Manuf. 413 Amid the contagious habits of great cities. |
2. a. Of diseases: Communicable or infectious by contact. See contagion 1.
| c 1400 Lanfranc's Cirurg. 196 Þis [leprosy] is oon of the syknessis þat ben contagious. 1527 R. Thorne in Hakluyt Voy. (1589) 252 Of some contagious sickenesse he died. 1540 Act 32 Hen. VIII, c. 42 §3 The pestilence, great pockes, and such other contagious infirmityes. a 1626 Bacon in Resuscitatio (ed. Rawley) 111 Pestilences, Sweats, and other Contagious Diseases. 1710 Steele Tatler No. 10 ¶11 There is a contagious Sickness, which, it is feared, will end in a Pestilence. 1803 Med. Jrnl. X. 108, I do not think influenza to be contagious. 1879 Maclagan in 19th Cent. 810 When we wish to say that a disease is produced by personal contact with a person suffering from it..we call it contagious. |
Contagious Diseases Acts, the title of a number of acts of parliament passed in 1866 and following years, to check the propagation of venereal diseases in certain military and naval stations (‘C.D. Acts’), and to check the spread of rinderpest and other diseases among cattle (Contagious Diseases (Animals) Acts).
| 1866 Resolution Ho. Commons 24 Apr., That it is expedient to make provision for the payment of any Expenses that may be incurred, under any Act of the present Session for the better prevention of Contagious Diseases at certain Naval and Military Stations. 1883 Times 21 Apr. 8/4. 1887 Ho. Commons 14 June, The Regulations..in force under the Contagious Diseases (Animals) Act, 1878. |
b. contagious abortion: a type of brucellosis in cattle caused by Brucella abortus and producing abortion.
| 1910 Jrnl. Infectious Dis. VII. 475 The bacillus of Bang is the microbic cause of at least some of the contagious abortion of cattle in this country. 1951 Harries & Mitman Clin. Practice in Infectious Dis. (ed. 4) xxx. 549 The high incidence of contagious abortion and the low incidence of abortus fever. |
3. Tainted with and communicating contagion: charged with the germs of an infectious disease.
| 1586 Cogan Haven Health ccxliii. (1636) 301 The clothes especially of woollen..continue contagious by the space of three yeares, and more. 1722 De Foe Plague (1840) 179 Their breath, their sweat, their very clothes, were contagious for many days before. Ibid. (Rtldg.) 251 They might go about seemingly whole, and yet be contagious to all those that came near them. 1813 J. Thomson Lect. Inflam. 350 The absorption of..bile, milk, contagious matters. |
4. fig. Apt to be communicated from one to another or to others. (Cf. catching, infectious.)
| 1660 Boyle Seraph. Love 144 If our Friends do not allay our Love or Affection by unwelcome Actions, or their contagious Sufferings. 1667 Milton P.L. ix. 1036 Well understood Of Eve, whose Eye darted contagious Fire. 1689 Shadwell Bury F. ii. i, I see this Folly is contagious. 1730 Thomson Autumn 1113 From Look to Look contagious thro' the Croud The Pannic runs. 1769 Junius Lett. xv. 68 Ripened to..maturity of corruption, the worst examples cease to be contagious. 1867 Emerson Lett. & Soc. Aims, Progr. Culture Wks. (Bohn) III. 235 All vigour is contagious, and when we see creation we also begin to create. |
II. In more general sense: Breeding disease, injurious, noxious.
† 5. a. Apt to breed or infect with disease, fever-breeding, pestilential; ‘that corrupteth or infecteth’ (Table Alph. 1613). Obs.
| 1398 Trevisa Barth. De P.R. xvii. xxiv. (1495) 618 The stenche and lothsom sauour of deed caraynes and other daungerous and contagyous ayres. 1512 Act 4 Hen. VIII, c. 8 Which prison is oon of the most anoyous, contagious and detestablest places withyn this realme. 1555 Eden Decades 122 The place is also contagious..by reason it is coompased aboute with muddy and stynkynge marysshes. 1587 R. Scot in Holinshed III. 1546/1 This summer..was verie hot and contagious. 1633 J. Russell Batt. Lutzen in Harl. Misc. (Malh.) IV. 184 Contagious and poisonous desarts. 1691 Ray Creation i. (1704) 103 Noisom and contagious Vapours. 1792 S. Rogers Pleas. Mem. ii. 271 Those tend'rer tints that..in the world's contagious climate die. |
† b. Hurtful or injurious as food. Obs.
| c 1450 Henryson Mor. Fab. 50 To fyle your teeth or lippes with my blude, Whilke to your stomacke is contagious. c 1510 Barclay Mirr. Gd. Manners (1570) G ij, Can kepe him from daunger of meate contagious. 1547 Boorde Brev. Health xxxii. 18 Beware of contagious meates and drynkes, as newe ale..newe hote bread, etc. 1594 Plat Jewell-ho. i. 8 Unto man..the eating of much salt is very contagious, because it maketh the blood salt. |
† c. Foul, noisome, fetid. Obs.
| 1547 Boorde Brev. Health §321 Let him vse odiferous and no contagiouse ayers. 1590 Nashe Pref. Greene's Menaphon (Arb.) 7 The vnsauorie sent of the pitchy slime, that Euphrates cast vp, and the contagious fumes of goats beards burned. |
† 6. Injurious to human life or health otherwise than by breeding disease; pernicious, noxious.
| c 1430 Lydg. Bochas ix. xxii. (1554) 206 a, Most in murdre he was contagious Of Innocent blood to make effusion. 1494 Fabyan Chron. i. xix. 17 Flyes..so noyous and contageous, that they slewe moche people. 1599 Hakluyt Voy. II. ii. 105 Now the Winter comming vpon vs with much contagious weather. 1650 Bulwer Anthropomet. 199 Rid them out of the world..as contagious beasts. 1653 H. Cogan tr. Pinto's Trav. 243 All kind of contagious creatures, as lizards, serpents, and adders. |
† 7. Morally or socially injurious, noxious, or dangerous; grievous, ‘pestilent’. Obs.
| c 1440 Promp. Parv. 91 Contagyows or grevows to dele wythe, contagiosus. 1523 Ld. Berners Froiss. I. ccxxxiii. 323 So this ordynaunce of the pope was right contagyous to them. 1631 Weever Anc. Fun. Mon. 54 A contagious broode of Scismatickes. 1651 Hobbes Leviath. iii. xlii. 276 To cast out of their Synagogues, such as they thought in manners, or doctrine, contagious. |
8. Ecology. Of, pertaining to, or exhibiting contagion (see contagion 8).
| 1939 J. Neyman in Ann. Math. Statistics X. 36 The distributions considered belong to a class which Pólya proposed to call ‘contagious’: the presence of one larva within an experimental plot increases the chance of there being some more larvae. 1957 P. Greig-Smith Quant. Plant Ecology iii. 56 Recently contagious has been widely used for aggregated distributions generally, and this seems a suitable term, although originally applied by Pólya to a particular type of aggregation. Ibid. 78 If distribution is contagious then, whatever the exact nature of the contagion, the actual occurrence of individuals on the ground is..patchy. |