Meanings
- not comparableOf or causing fermentation.
- historicalnot comparablemedicineInfectious, contagious, of diseases originally regarded as being caused by a process similar to fermentation.
Farr concluded that overcrowding was the main determinant of high mortality from what (following Liebig) he style ‘zymotic diseases’.
1997, Roy Porter, The Greatest Benefit to Mankind, Folio Society, published 2016, page 3942 more examples
[…] these […] accounts by no means bear out the zymotic doctrine of the Board of Health as to the cause of cholera; for where the zymotic influences from the sewers were the worst, […] the cholera was the least destructive.
1851, Henry Mayhew, London Labour and the London Poor, volume 2, London: G. Newbold, page 395The incidence of zymotic diseases upon any particular organ or set of organs, is, of course, well recognised; one recalls the nephritis of scarlatina, the endocarditis of rheumatism, gastritis of rabies, and—perhaps the most striking instance of the selective affinity of disease for specific local manifestation—the lesions of foot-and-mouth disease.
1901 August 16, H. Watkins-Pitchford, “Horsesickness”, in The Agricultural Journal and Mining Record, volume 4, number 12, page 354
Synonyms & antonyms
adjectiveof or relating to or causing fermentation
Synonym sets from Open English WordNet, CC BY 4.0.
Origin
- Ancient Greekζυμωτικός“causing fermentation”
- Englishzymotic
From Ancient Greek ζυμωτικός (zumōtikós, “causing fermentation”), from ζυμοῦν (zumoûn).
More words from Ancient Greek
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
zymotic. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/zymotic
“zymotic.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/zymotic. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “zymotic,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/zymotic.
Source: zymotic on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.