Crossword clues for paroxysm
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Paroxysm \Par"ox*ysm\, n. [F. paroxysme, Gr. ?, fr. ? to sharpen, irritate; para` beside, beyond + ? to sharpen, from ? sharp.]
(Med.) The fit, attack, or exacerbation, of a disease that occurs at intervals, or has decided remissions or intermissions.
--Arbuthnot.-
Any sudden and violent emotion; spasmodic passion or action; a convulsion; a fit.
The returning paroxysms of diffidence and despair.
--South.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
"sudden attack, convulsion," early 15c., from Middle French paroxysme (16c.), earlier paroxime (13c.), from Medieval Latin paroxysmus "irritation, fit of a disease," from Greek paroxysmos "irritation, exasperation," from paroxynein "to irritate, goad, provoke," from para- "beyond" (see para- (1)) + oxynein "sharpen, goad," from oxys "sharp, pointed" (see acrid). Non-medical sense first attested c.1600. Related: Paroxysmal.
Wiktionary
n. A random or sudden outburst (of activity).
WordNet
n. a sudden uncontrollable attack; "a paroxysm of giggling"; "a fit of coughing"; "convulsions of laughter" [syn: fit, convulsion]
Usage examples of "paroxysm".
Devon, gentle as none of them had seen him, helped to beguile her in the long weak hours between her paroxysms.
Catherine Wallenstein lay dead, not struck down by some primitive paroxysm of rage as it appeared, rather felled by the terminal onslaught of a massive and incurable disorder that had been ravaging him for years with a fever resembling paratyphoid, noncommunicable among humans, a condition visited upon him during the onset of puberty when he had first contracted a rare and largely extinct mountain strain of Albanian hoof and mouth disease.
When pinned, he preferred to disarm Proxenus by grinning spastically and singing faintly obscene ditties that would soon have his older cousin collapsed in paroxysms of laughter.
After birth the child had seven malarial paroxysms but recovered, the splenic tumor disappearing.
El Sangre flew into a paroxysm of educated bucking of the most advanced school.
Individuals react to these events with a chronic uncharitableness punctuated by paroxysms of hate, rage and fear.
When they had recovered from the paroxysm the unteroffizier asked me where I had come from.
In a paroxysm of passion Selamlik Pasha called two Abyssinian slaves standing behind.
It is Aunt Agata the nun, sister of Grandfather Mariano, who is most determined to defend his rights, and it is she who sticks her neck out in paroxysms of indignation.
Yes or no, did I yield to the paroxysm of choler which possessed me on hearing of the engagement of Ardea and on finding that I was in the presence of that equivocal Hafner?
Thorington of Philadelphia has seen a paroxysm of epilepsy induced by the instillation of atropia in the eye of a child nearly cured of the malady.
During the entire paroxysm the patient should be kept in bed, and in the cold stage, covered with blankets and surrounded with bottles of hot water.
Eventually he collapsed onto the bed again, still fighting off paroxysms of chuckles while Erik stared at him in icy irritation.
The blood of one of the cut vessels entered the trachea and caused an extra paroxysm of dyspnea, but the clots of blood were removed by curved forceps.
The boy had fits, and when the paroxysm had passed, he went into a rigid sleep.