Abortive | aborted pregnancy; see also miscarriage and still-born |
Aged | death by natural causes of old age |
Ague | chills and fever; often from malaria |
Apoplexy | rupture of an internal organ, especially the brain |
Asthma | chronic inflamation of the airways, making it difficult to breathe |
Beaten | |
Bed-ridden | confined to bed through sickness or infirmity |
Blasted | |
Bleeding | |
Bloody-flux | bloody diarrhea, esp. from dysentery |
Burnt | |
Calenture | probably heat stroke or sunstroke |
Cancer | per OED: Originally: any of various types of non-healing sore or ulcer (cf. canker); In later use (chiefly as mass noun): spec. malignant neoplastic disease, in which there is an uncontrolled proliferation of cells, typically with invasion and destruction of adjacent normal tissue, and often with metastatic spread to distant parts of the body via lymphatics or blood vessels; an instance of this, a malignant tumor. |
Child-Bed | death during childbirth |
Chrisoms | infant deaths under one month old |
Cold | assorted viral, respiratory illnesses believed to be caused by a humoreal imbalance (too much coldness) |
Colick | severe stomach pain due to issue with bowels |
Consumption | wasting disease, esp. tuberculosis |
Convulsion | |
Cough | |
Cramp | |
Diabetes | |
Distracted | coded language for suicide/accidental death due to mental illness |
Dropsie | swelling of tissue due to accumulation of excess water, sign of organ failure |
Drowned | |
Executed | |
Falling-sickness | epileptic seizures |
Fever | |
Fistula | abnormal connection between two organs |
Flox | hemorrhagic smallpox |
Flux | diarrhea, esp. from dysentery |
Frighted | frightened to death |
French-Pox | syphilis |
Gangreen | death of body tissue b/c lack of blood flow or bacterial infection |
Gout | urate crystals accumulating in joints |
Grief | died of grief |
Griping in the Guts | sudden intense pain in the intestines, diarrhoea |
Gripes | intestinal pain |
Headache | |
Headmouldshot | |
Hiccough | |
Hooping Cough | whooping cough |
Horshoehead | |
Impostume | bacterial abscess |
Infants | death of a child over a month old but still in infancy |
Inflammation | |
Itch | |
Jaundies | liver disease, causes yellowing of skin and eyes |
Jaw-fallen | |
Killed | |
Kings Evil | tubercular infection of throat lymph glands/tuberculosis lymphadenitis |
Leprosie | leprosy |
Lethargy | unnatural drowsiness |
Liver-grown | swollen liver |
Lunatick | death of someone with mental illness; see also 'distracted' |
Looseness | |
Lunatick and Frenzy | |
Malignant Fever | |
Meagrim | |
Measles | |
Miscarriage | aborted pregnancy; see also abortive and still-born |
Mortification | |
Mother | |
Murthered | murdered |
Noli me tangere | |
Overlaid | accidental smothering of an infant by rolling over them in sleep |
Palsie | paralysis, weakness, or other problems using muscles, including tremors |
Plague | disease caused by y. pestis |
Planet | |
Plurisie | inflammation of tissue lining the lungs |
Purples | any disease causing a dark red or purple rash |
Quinsie | complication of tonsillitis, infection spreads beyond tonsils |
Rash | |
Rheumatism | |
Rickets | weakening of bones b/c of prolonged vitamin D deficiency |
Rising of the Lights | difficulty breathing or a choking sensation |
Running of the Reins | gonorrhea or other sexually transmitted infection (sometimes including syphilis) |
Rupture | hernia |
Scald Head | |
Scalded | burnt by hot water |
Scarlet Fever | |
Sciatica | |
Scowring | purging bowels? |
Scurvy | disease caused by vitamin C deficiency |
Shingles | |
Smallpox | infectious disease; flu-like symptoms, rash which spreads from face to trunk |
Sores | |
Spleen | |
Spotted-Fever | per OED: 1623-; any of various febrile dsieases characterized by the appearance of (esp. petechial or purpuric) spots on the skin, as meningococcal meningitis and typhus; (now) spec. any of a group of tick-borne diseases caused by bacteria of the genus Rickettsia |
St. Anthony's Fire | |
Starved | |
Still-born | child born lifeless or with a heartbeat but failing to breathe |
Stone | concretion in the body, esp. kidneys, bladder or gallbladder |
Stopping of the Stomach | |
Strangury | slow and painful urination |
Strongullion | |
Suddenly | sudden death with no other attributable cause |
Suicide | |
Surfeit | excess of food or drink |
Swelling in the Throat | |
Swine-Pox | |
Teeth | |
Thrush | white specks inside the mouth and throat, also lips and tongue |
Tympany | per OED: sometimes used vaguely for a morbid swelling or tumour of any kind; cross-linked to entry on tympanites which is distention of the abdomen by gas or air in the intestine, the peritoneal cavity, or the uterus |
Tissick | per OED: coughing or wheezing; any of various diseases characterized by this, esp. asthma or bronchitis. Also: a tickling cough; a fit of coughing or wheezing; cross-referenced to phthisis which is a wasting disease, esp. one involving the lungs; spec. tuberculosis |
Twisting of the Guts | |
Ulcer | |
Vapours | |
Vomiting | |
Water in the Head | |
Wen | |
Wind | |
Wolf | |
Worms | |
Wounded | |