Adjacent Words

Delirium definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

DELIRIUM, n. [L. To wander in mind, to rave; to make balks in plowing, that is, to err, wander, miss.]
A state in which the ideas of a person are wild, irregular and unconnected, or do not correspond with the truth or with external objects; a roving or wandering of the mind; disorder of the intellect. Fevers often produce delirium.
An alienation of mind connected with fever.
Symptomatic derangement, or that which is dependent on some other disease, in distinction from idiopathic derrangement or mania.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

n
1: state of violent mental agitation [syn: craze, delirium, frenzy, fury, hysteria]
2: a usually brief state of excitement and mental confusion often accompanied by hallucinations

Merriam Webster's

noun Etymology: Latin, from delirare to be crazy, literally, to leave the furrow (in plowing), from de- + lira furrow — more at learn Date: circa 1563 1. an acute mental disturbance characterized by confused thinking and disrupted attention usually accompanied by disordered speech and hallucinations 2. frenzied excitement <he would stride about his room in a delirium of joy — Thomas Wolfe>

Oxford Reference Dictionary

n. 1 an acutely disordered state of mind involving incoherent speech, hallucinations, and frenzied excitement, occurring in metabolic disorders, intoxication, fever, etc. 2 great excitement, ecstasy. Phrases and idioms: delirium tremens a psychosis of chronic alcoholism involving tremors and hallucinations. Etymology: L f. delirare be deranged (as DE-, lira ridge between furrows)

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Delirium De*lir"i*um, n. [L., fr. delirare to rave, to wander in mind, prop., to go out of the furrow in plowing; de- + lira furrow, track; perh. akin to G. geleise track, rut, and E. last to endure.] 1. (Med.) A state in which the thoughts, expressions, and actions are wild, irregular, and incoherent; mental aberration; a roving or wandering of the mind, -- usually dependent on a fever or some other disease, and so distinguished from mania, or madness. 2. Strong excitement; wild enthusiasm; madness. The popular delirium [of the French Revolution] at first caught his enthusiastic mind. --W. Irving. The delirium of the preceding session (of Parliament). --Morley. Delirium tremens. [L., trembling delirium] (Med.), a violent delirium induced by the excessive and prolonged use of intoxicating liquors.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

If someone is suffering from delirium, they are not able to think or speak in a sensible and reasonable way because they are very ill and have a fever. In her delirium, she had fallen to the floor several times.

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

n. Wandering (as in fevers), incoherence, hallucination, derangement, insanity, frenzy, raving, madness, alienation of mind.

Moby Thesaurus

abandon, afebrile delirium, agnosia, apparition, ardor, block, blocking, brainchild, brainstorm, bubble, calenture, childbed fever, chimera, continued fever, craze, deliriousness, delusion, delusion of persecution, disorientation, ecstasy, eidolon, enthusiasm, eruptive fever, fancy, fantasque, fantasy, febricity, febrility, fervor, fever, fever heat, feverishness, fiction, figment, fire, fire and fury, flight of ideas, flush, frenzy, furor, furore, fury, hallucination, hallucinosis, heat, hectic, hectic fever, hectic flush, hyperpyrexia, hyperthermia, hysteria, idle fancy, illusion, imagery, imagination, imagining, incoherence, insubstantial image, intermittent fever, intoxication, invention, lingual delirium, madness, maggot, make-believe, mental block, mental confusion, myth, nihilism, nihilistic delusion, orgasm, orgy, paralogia, passion, phantasm, phantom, protein fever, psychological block, puerperal fever, pyrexia, rage, ranting, rapture, raving, ravishment, relapsing fever, remittent, remittent fever, romance, sick fancy, tearing passion, thick-coming fancies, towering rage, transport, trip, urethral fever, vaccinal fever, vapor, vision, wandering, water fever, whim, whimsy, wildest dreams, wound fever, zeal