quarantine

Definition

A period of 40 days, particularly

Etymology

From Medieval Latin quarentena and quarentīna (“40-day period, Lent”) via Middle English quarentine, Norman quarenteine, French quarenteine, and Italian quarantina, via proposed Late Latin *quaranta + -ēna (forming distributive adjectives), from Latin quadrāgintā (“four tens, 40”). In reference to French politics, calque of French quarantaine after edicts of Louis IX. In reference to a severance of political relations, popularized by the Roosevelt administration's 1937 approach to the Axis powers and the later Kennedy administration's 1962 approach to Cuba during the missile crisis.

Example Sentences

• "Now the Question seems to lye thus, where lay the Seeds of the Infection all this while? How came it to stop so long, and not stop any longer? Either the Distemper did not come immediately by Contagion from Body to Body, or if it did, then a Body may be capable to continue infected, without the Disease discovering itself, many Days, nay Weeks together, even not a Quarantine of Days only, but Soixantine, not only 40 Days but 60 Days or longer."
• "Querentyne is where a man dyeth seisyd of a maner place and other landis where of the wyfe ought to be indowed, than the woman shall hold the maner place by .xl. days within which tyme her dower shalbe to her assyned."
• "Quarantain of the King, is a Truce of forty Days appointed by S. Louis; during which it was expressly forbid to take any Revenge of the Relation or Friends of People."