cancer

cancer
\ \ [14] Cancer comes from Latin cancer, which meant literally ‘crab’. It was a translation of Greek karkínoscrab’, which, together with its derivative karkínōma (source of English carcinoma [18]) was, according to the ancient Greek physician Galen, applied to tumours on account of the crablike pattern formed by the distended blood vessels around the affected part.
\ \ Until the 17th century, the term generally used for the condition in English was canker, which arose from an earlier borrowing of Latin cancer in Old English times; before then, cancer had been used exclusively in the astrological sense.
\ \ The French derivative of Latin cancer, chancre, was borrowed into English in the 16th century for ‘syphilitic ulcer’.
\ \ Cf.CANKER, CARCINOMA

Word origins - 2ed. . 2005.

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