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Webster 1913 Edition

Noun.

[Gr. [GREEK] irritation, fr. [GREEK] to stir, rouse, fr. [GREEK] to stir: cf. F.

éréthisme

(Med.)

A morbid degree of excitement or irritation in an organ.

Hoblyn.

erethism ‎(plural erethisms)

(pathology) Abnormal excitement of a bodily organ or tissue.
Any unusual or morbid overexcitement.
- 1978, Robert Hurley, trans. Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality Volume I, Penguin 1978, p. 32:
  Since the eighteenth century, sex has not ceased to provoke a kind of generalized discursive erethism.

pathology: abnormal excitement

over-excitement