febrile
/ˈfi brəl/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: 2.55 in modern English
12
Scrabble Score
7
Letters
2
Syllables
6
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
Feverish, or having a high temperature.
Example Sentences
- "Aurora's orange sun (Baley scarcely noted the orange tinge now) was mildly warm on his back, lacking the febrile heat that Earth's sun had in summer (but, then, what was the climate and season on this portion of Aurora right now?)."
- "An already febrile atmosphere within the ground before the start had been stoked still further when France's players formed an arrow formation to face down the haka, and then advanced slowly over halfway as the capacity crowd roared."
- "Out in the ground, meanwhile, it was particularly disappointing to hear former England captain Andrew Strauss put the febrile atmosphere down to “people who don’t normally come to Lord’s”."
- "Harry Potter has become such a febrile battleground that the pattern has already become well worn."
Etymology
Borrowed from Medieval Latin febrīlis, from Latin febris (“fever”). By surface analysis, Latin febr- + -ile.
Origin
- Source language: Latin
Word Breakdown
- Root: febrīlis, febris
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈfi brəl/
- British English: /ˈfiːbraɪl/
Inflected Forms
more febrile (comparative)
most febrile (superlative)