Lyfan

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. To apply medicine or a healing remedy to someone or something in order to cure an ailment
2. To administer a drug or remedy to a sick person so as to restore their health
3. To dose or doctor a patient with medicinal substances in the hope of healing them

Etymology: Lyfan is an Old English verb that survives today only in its ghostly descendant, "leave." The earlier sense of the verb was "to administer a medicine or remedy," and it is a straightforward derivative of "lyf," meaning "medicine, drug, or healing potion." That noun is the same word as "life" in the sense of a living remedy, so the core idea is of a substance that restores vitality to a sick body. The word's most surprising feature is what happened to it in Middle English. The verb "lyfan" was already passing out of use by the early medieval period, but its root survived in the noun "lyf" and the phrase "to live" was not derived from it. Modern "leave" is a separate word, not a continuation of this one. This verb is recorded in the Old English medical texts of the Leechbook, where it appears in remedies directing that a sick person be given a particular preparation, and it fell out of the language without leaving a direct English descendant of its own meaning.