Skip to main content
PlainSpell

feverfew

noun

feverfew is a noun meaning “A European aromatic perennial herb, Tanacetum parthenium (or Chrysanthemum parthenium or Pyrethrum parthenium), having daisy-like flowers; valued as…” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled F-E-V-E-R-F-E-W and has 3 syllables, and it appears about once in every 32 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of feverfew is feverfews.

What does feverfew mean?

noun

  1. 1

    A European aromatic perennial herb, Tanacetum parthenium (or Chrysanthemum parthenium or Pyrethrum parthenium), having daisy-like flowers; valued as a traditional medicine, especially for headaches.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How do you pronounce feverfew?

    Feverfew has 3 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).

    Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

    Forms of feverfew

    • feverfews plural

    Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

    How common is feverfew?

    Feverfew appears about once in every 32 million words in written English, the 171,907th most frequent word form in the list.

    Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

    Feverfew in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

    In the sense Tanacetum parthenium:

    LanguageWords
    Frenchgrande camomille
    GermanMutterkraut, Fieberkraut, Zierkamille, Falsche Kamille
    Spanishmatricaria, hierba santa

    Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

    Where does feverfew come from?

    From Middle English feverfu, feverfeu, feverfugie, modified by folk etymology from either Old French fevrefue or Old English feferfuge, both from Latin febrifugia, from febris (“fever”) + fugō (“to drive away”). Doublet of febrifuge.

    Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).