Old Medical Terms: What Your Ancestor Really Died Of

Causes of death in old records reflect the medicine of the time, and often were reported by a family member rather than a doctor. Treat these modern meanings as the most likely ones, not certain diagnoses. For more, read Old Causes of Death Decoded.

Old term	Usual modern meaning
Ague	Recurring fever with chills and shaking, usually malaria.
Apoplexy	Stroke, or any sudden collapse and death.
Bilious fever	Fever with nausea or jaundice; could be malaria, typhoid, hepatitis or another liver illness.
Brain fever	Fever with confusion or seizures: meningitis, encephalitis or typhoid.
Bright's disease	Kidney disease (nephritis).
Catarrh	Inflammation of the nose and throat with heavy mucus, like a severe cold.
Childbed fever / puerperal fever	Infection after childbirth.
Cholera infantum / summer complaint	Severe diarrhea in infants and children, common in hot weather.
Congestion of the lungs / lung fever	Pneumonia.
Consumption / phthisis	Usually tuberculosis of the lungs; literally a "wasting away."
Croup	Breathing difficulty with a barking cough in children; sometimes diphtheria.
Debility	Weakness or loss of strength; not a specific disease.
Dentition / teething	Given as a cause of death in infants, who usually died of infections or diarrhea at teething age.
Dropsy	Swelling from fluid buildup (edema), often from heart or kidney failure.
Dropsy of the brain	Hydrocephalus, or sometimes meningitis.
Dysentery / bloody flux	Severe diarrhea with blood.
Erysipelas / St. Anthony's fire	A spreading skin infection, usually streptococcal.
Falling sickness	Epilepsy.
Flux	Diarrhea.
Grippe / la grippe	Influenza.
Inanition	Exhaustion from lack of food, or inability to eat.
King's evil / scrofula	Tuberculosis of the lymph nodes of the neck.
Lockjaw	Tetanus.
Marasmus	Severe wasting from malnutrition, especially in infants.
Milk sickness	Poisoning from the milk of cows that ate white snakeroot; common on the frontier in the early 1800s.
Mortification	Gangrene.
Old age / senility	Death in old age without a diagnosed cause.
Palsy	Paralysis or tremors.
Putrid fever / ship fever / jail fever	Usually typhus.
Putrid sore throat	Diphtheria or a severe strep throat.
Quinsy	An abscess near the tonsils.
Scarlatina	Scarlet fever.
Softening of the brain	Brain degeneration after a stroke, or dementia.
Visitation of God	Sudden death from natural causes; common in coroners' verdicts.
Winter fever	Pneumonia.
Yellow jack	Yellow fever.