What does variolate mean?
Variolate is a rare medical and historical word associated with deliberate smallpox inoculation. As a transitive verb, it means to inoculate someone with variola virus, the virus that causes smallpox. From the seventeenth century onward, practitioners performed this procedure by introducing material from a smallpox lesion into the skin or nose, hoping that the resulting infection would be mild and confer lasting immunity. As an adjective, variolate means relating to variola or to inoculation with that virus. The practice, now obsolete, was dangerous because it could transmit severe smallpox to the recipient or to people nearby. It was eventually displaced by vaccination using the related vaccinia virus and later became unnecessary after the global eradication of smallpox. Today, variolate survives mainly in specialist histories of medicine and vaccination.
To inoculate someone with material containing variola virus.
"The doctor variolated the child during the early eighteenth century."
Historically used for the now-obsolete practice of deliberate smallpox inoculation.
Relating to variola, smallpox, or the deliberate inoculation of variola virus.
"The variolate vaccine was highly effective but could itself cause severe smallpox."
Rare and chiefly technical or historical.
Before modern vaccines, variolation deliberately gave people smallpox, betting that a controlled infection would protect them from a deadlier one.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Etymology of variolate
Variolate comes through New Latin from the Latin variola, the name of smallpox. Its verb and adjective forms developed from Latin-derived terminology for inoculation and for being affected by variola. Modern cognates include variolous, meaning associated with or resembling smallpox, and varioloid, a term historically used for a disease resembling smallpox.
Related word forms
How variolate is actually used
This is rare, specialized medical and historical vocabulary. The verb is chiefly associated with the historical practice of variolation, while the adjective occurs in technical or historical discussions of smallpox inoculation.
Easily confused with variolate
Variola is the viral disease known as smallpox, whereas variolate describes inoculation with the virus or something relating to that procedure.