Dictionaries of the Scots Language
Dictionars o the Scots Leid

Scottish National Dictionary (1700–)

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First published 1952 (SND Vol. III).
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.

‡ELIC PASSION, n. comb. Also ellicpasson; eelicpassun (Fif.¹⁰ 1935). Corruptions of the medical term iliac passion, “a term used by medical writers in the 18th and early 19th centuries to indicate what we now know as appendicitis. It drifted into the vernacular through the widespread use of Buchan's Domestic Medicine which had a wide vogue in Scotland in the 18th and 19th centuries; used rarely now to mean colic” (Fif.¹⁰ 1935; Knr.¹ 1950). [′ilɪkpɑs(ʃ)ən, ′əɪlɪk-, ′elɪk- Fif.]Edb. 1828 D. M. Moir Mansie Wauch (1839) xxii.:
After having ate as many strawberries as we could well stow away, he began trying to fright me with stories of folk taking the elic passion — the colic — the mulligrubs — and other deadly maladies, on account of neglecting to swallow a drop of something warm to qualify the coldness of the fruit.Abd. 1915 H. Beaton Back o' Benachie 101:
I h'ard o' an 'oman at Culsalmon deein' efter a day's illness wi' ellicpasson. They said she coukit an' coukit nar her hert oot, an' hid an awfu' thirst.