Meanings
- archaicnot comparableSurgical.
For none but a clever dialectician / Can hope to become a great physician; / […] / After this there are five years more / Devoted wholly to medicine, / With lectures on chirurgical lore, / And dissections of the bodies of swine, / As likest the human form divine.
1851, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, The Golden Legend, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, →OCLC, page 2661 more example
We cannot reasonably ſuppoſe that Adam, who was ſo univerſally Skill'd in the Natures of all Plants, ſhould have been ignorant of their Vulnerary Qualities: Or that he would not employ this his Skill in endeavouring to cure Wounds, or Hurts, when any of his new-planted Stock had the Misfortune te^([sic]) receive 'em. Abel was wounded and kill'd by Cain, and can we imagine that Adams Prudence would not uſe its Chirugical endevours to redreſs ſuch diſaſters, when poſſible[?]
'1699, Robert Barret, A Companion for Midwives, Child-Bearing Women, and Nurses., London, Preface
Origin
- Medieval Latinchirurgicālis
- Middle Frenchcirurgical
- Middle Englishcirurgical
- Englishchirurgical
From Middle English cirurgical, from Middle French cirurgical, from Medieval Latin chirurgicālis.
More words from Middle English, Middle French, Medieval Latin
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
chirurgical. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/chirurgical
“chirurgical.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/chirurgical. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “chirurgical,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/chirurgical.
Source: chirurgical on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.