Path. [f. Gr. ἀνά up + σάρξ (σάρκα) flesh; perh. orig. a phrase, or adj. sing. fem., but at length taken as sb.] A dropsical affection of the subcutaneous cellular tissue of a limb or other large surface of the body, producing a very puffed appearance of the flesh.
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., VII. lii. (1495), 265. The dropesye that hyghte Yposarca other Anasarca.
1681. trans. Willis’ Rem. Med. Wks. Anasarca, the watry dropsy swelling up the whole flesh.
1732. Arbuthnot, Rules of Diet, 391. When the Lymph stagnates, or is extravasated, under the Skin, it is called an Anasarka.
1836. Todd, Cycl. Anat. & Phys., I. 425/2. Symptoms of sea-scurvy … with anasarca of the lower limbs.
b. transf. and fig.
1807. Edin. Rev., XI. 83. A similar fanciful analogy has induced him to give the name of Anasarca to the redundant moisture that is perceived in vegetables during wet weather.
1841. D’Israeli, Amen. Lit. (1859), I. 316. An aged power dissolving in its own corruption, which … looked with complacency on its own unnatural greatness, its political anasarca.
1873. Treas. Bot. (ed. 2), 61. Anasarca, a condition of plants analogous to dropsy.
