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fester.

A fistula.

6 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈfɛstə/British, Northern-England, Received-Pronunciation, Southern, Standard, Wales/ˈfɛstɚ/General-American/ˈfestə/Australia, New-Zealand[ˈfestə] ~ [ˈfe̞stə]Australia
  1. A fistula.

    obsolete
  2. A sore or an ulcer of the skin.

  3. The condition of something that festers; a festering; a festerment.

Where this word comes from

Inherited from Middle English festre, festur, borrowed from Old French festre (cognate with Italian fistola, Occitan fistola, Spanish fístula), from Latin fistula. The verb is derived from the noun, while the “condition of something that festers” noun sense is derived from the verb. Doublet of fistula.

verb/ˈfɛstə/British, Northern-England, Received-Pronunciation, Southern, Standard, Wales/ˈfɛstɚ/General-American/ˈfestə/Australia, New-Zealand[ˈfestə] ~ [ˈfe̞stə]Australia
  1. To become septic; to become rotten.

    intransitive
  2. To worsen, especially due to lack of attention.

    figuratively · intransitive
    Deal with the problem immediately; do not let it fester.
  3. To cause to fester or rankle.

    transitive
Where this word comes from

Inherited from Middle English festre, festur, borrowed from Old French festre (cognate with Italian fistola, Occitan fistola, Spanish fístula), from Latin fistula. The verb is derived from the noun, while the “condition of something that festers” noun sense is derived from the verb. Doublet of fistula.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.