Sc. Obs. Forms: 6 wedonynpha (vedumfa), 8 wytenon-fa, 9 weidinonfa. [f. OE. wéden- (in wéden-heort, -séoc) mad + onfa’, ONFALL. Cf. WIDDENDREAM.] Ague (in later use spec. puerperal ague, WEED sb.3), or a fit of this.
c. 1500. Rowlis Cursing, 57, in Bannatyne MS. (Hunter. Club), 300. The worme, the wareit wedonynpha [Maitl. MS. vedumfa], Rumbursin, ripplis, or bellythra[w].
1597. in Pitcairn, Crim. Trials (Bannatyne Club), II. 27. Item, for hailling of women of the Wedonynpha [by sorcery].
1755. R. Forbes, Ajax, etc. Jrnl. to Portsmouth, 33. I wis fley’d that she had taen the wytenon-fa,… far she shuddered a’ like a klippert in a cauld day.
1808. Jamieson, Wedonypha.… This [see quot. 1755] is rendered ‘trembling, chattering.’ But it is the term generally used in the North, to express that disease peculiar to women, commonly called a weid; weidinonfa. Ang[us].
