Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A medicinal infusion, such as sweetened barley water.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A mild harmless drink, or one having a slight medicinal quality, as barley-water or herb-tea.
  • noun Grape-juice allowed to drain on the slab, without pressure.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun A decoction of barley with other ingredients; a farinaceous drink.
  • noun (Med.) An aqueous medicine, containing little, if any, medicinal agent; a tea or tisane.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Alternative spelling of tisane.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English tisane, peeled barley, barley water, from Old French, from Latin ptisana, tisana, from Greek ptisanē, from ptissein, to crush.]

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Examples

  • A large cup of ptisan was presented by the page, which the sick man swallowed with eager and trembling haste.

    The Fair Maid of Perth 2008

  • For, besides the other virtues of ptisan, its lubricant quality prevents the barley that is swallowed from proving injurious, for it does not stick nor remain in the region of the breast; for that which is well boiled is very lubricant, excellent for quenching thirst, of very easy digestion, and very weak, all which qualities are wanted.

    On Regimen In Acute Diseases 2007

  • But the head should be rubbed by the sponge until it is quite dry; the extremities should be protected from cold, as also the head and the rest of the body; and a man should not be washed immediately after he has taken a draught of ptisan or a drink; neither should he take ptisan as a drink immediately after the bath.

    On Regimen In Acute Diseases 2007

  • Those, then, who make use of ptisan in such diseases, should never for a day allow their vessels to be empty of it, if I may say so, but should use it and not intermit, unless it be necessary to stop for a time, in order to administer medicine or a clyster.

    On Regimen In Acute Diseases 2007

  • It may suit well to drink a little of this at night before the draught of ptisan, and when a considerable interval of time has passed after the draught there will be nothing to prevent its being taken.

    On Regimen In Acute Diseases 2007

  • And moreover if, while the pain of the side persists, and does not yield to warm fomentations, and the sputa are not brought up, but are viscid and unconcocted, unless one get the pain resolved, either by loosening the bowels, or opening a vein, whichever of these may be proper; — if to persons so circumstanced ptisan be administered, their speedy death will be the result.

    On Regimen In Acute Diseases 2007

  • If the expectoration be easy, and the breathing free, if his sides be free of pain, and if the fever be gone, he may take the ptisan thicker, and in larger quantity, twice a day.

    On Regimen In Acute Diseases 2007

  • These symptoms supervene, not only if ptisan be administered unseasonably, but still more if any other food or drink worse than ptisan be given.

    On Regimen In Acute Diseases 2007

  • But if he shall use ptisan for a draught, and drink afterward hydromel, he will feel full, flatulent, and uncomfortable in the viscera of the hypochondrium; but if the hydromel be taken before the draught, it will not have the same injurious effects as if taken after it, but will be rather beneficial.

    On Regimen In Acute Diseases 2007

  • One may first use the juice, and then the ptisan, attending accurately to the rules formerly laid down.

    On Regimen In Acute Diseases 2007

Comments

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  • What the hell, I just found it in Wikipedia.

    June 24, 2008

  • Compare the French word tisane, which means "herbal tea".

    June 24, 2008

  • Don't spread it too widely or it will be in tall, grande and venti before you can say ....

    June 24, 2008

  • Hey barista, a King size ptisacchaccino and a shortbread cookie.

    June 24, 2008

  • From time to time he would rub his limbs with his aloe-wood spatula, or perhaps he would break off to drink a ptisan made of the ashes of a weasel and asparagus boiled in vinegar from a silver cup handed to him by a slave; then he would wipe his lips with a scarlet napkin...

    - Flaubert, Salammbo, ch. 2

    December 9, 2008

  • Weaselashes. Yum!

    December 9, 2008

  • I only drink ptisan with pterodactyl.

    December 9, 2008

  • ptisan blarney!!! With ptisacchaccino?!

    kismet?

    January 26, 2013

  • Any word that starts with pt is already more interesting.

    February 28, 2018

  • Good conversation here. Ptop drawer.

    February 28, 2018