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Pronunciation varies by accent · noun
(obsolete, used in historical fiction) A particular ailment unknown to, and uncurable by, medical science.
These are to give notice, (for the benefit of the public,) that there is newly arrived from his travels, a gentleman, who, after above forty years' study, hath, by a wonderful blessing on his endeavours, discovered, as well the nature as the infallible cure of several strange diseases, which (though as yet not known to the world) he will plainly demonstrate to any ingenious artist, to be the greatest causes of the most common distempers incident to the body of man. The names of which take as follow : / The strong fives / The marthambles / The moon-pall / The hockogrocle.
If you can manage an attack of the Marthambles, we could persuade one to say an incantation over you. You would then be anointed with infallible remedies -- say, live earworms mashed into alcohol.
[…] Abse, a member of the afterguard, whose complaint was known as the marthambles at sea and griping of the guts by land, a disease whose cause Stephen did not know and whose symptoms he could only render more nearly bearable by opiates […]
Use marthambles when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.
Marthambles means (obsolete, used in historical fiction) A particular ailment unknown to, and uncurable by, medical science.
The closest synonym depends on the sentence and intended sense.
The opposite depends on the specific sense.
These are to give notice, (for the benefit of the public,) that there is newly arrived from his travels, a gentleman, who, after above forty years' study, hath, by a wonderful blessing on his endeavours, discovered, as well the nature as the infallible cure of several strange diseases, which (though as yet not known to the world) he will plainly demonstrate to any ingenious artist, to be the greatest causes of the most common distempers incident to the body of man. The names of which take as follow : / The strong fives / The marthambles / The moon-pall / The hockogrocle.
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