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Chronic Endeidis, this is from my Great-great Grandfather's death certificate as cause of death ( 1895 ). It is probably a variate spelling but I cannot find reference to it; either by itself or reference as a variation.

I have checked Google Books and Internet Archive but I could not find any reference in books printed around time of death. The certificate is not original but since it came from the county, it is probably only version available.

The certificate is from Lucas County, Ohio. "Chronic Endeidis" is printed not handwritten, seeing an image will not do much good here. I am familiar with the handwriting of time, and even some odd ones like Kurrant (a German script). Since this is a county document I am going to assume that is the correct spelling. It is possible this is a variation as end- or endo- are listed as variations of ent- by Free Dictionary.

What I think many of commenters are missing is the death happened in 1895. Common terms of today were not same back then. For instance his wife died of Senile Disability, though I have found references nobody is really sure what it might mean in modern terms.

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    What country and jurisdiction was this death certificate issued in?
    – PolyGeo ♦
    Aug 3, 2016 at 3:21
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    If you can provide an image of the death certificate, we might be able to determine possible alternative readings.
    – user104
    Aug 3, 2016 at 8:26
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    A guess is Chronic Enteritis, which is inflammation of the small intestine, but an image would certainly help.
    – AndyW
    Aug 3, 2016 at 9:08
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    @Kometman It is definitely not correctly spelled because there is no such thing as Endeidis. It would still be useful to see the clearly printed original, just because most people reading the question are probably not looking at these comments and will think you are reading it wrong
    – Harry V. ♦
    Aug 13, 2016 at 15:01
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    From the Online Etymology Dictionary, enteritis is: " 'acute inflammation of the bowels', 1808, medical Latin, coined c. 1750 ... from enteron 'intestine' + -itis 'inflammation'. " And 'chronic' just means 'long-lasting'. So it doesn't look like an implausible diagnosis for 1895. That's not to say it would be identical to a modern diagnosis with that name, but "long-term gut inflammation" is unspecific enough to be sensible at the time.
    – AndyW
    Oct 27, 2016 at 7:49

2 Answers 2

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I agree with other comments/answers, that this is probably due to misreading t's as d's, and you are looking at Enteritis.

Here are some resources to double check, or for future issues:

Genealogy Quest, medical terminology

archaicmedicalterms.com(link is to the E's)

Hall Genealogy Website has a list of medical terms

However, none of these has Endeidis.

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There is no such thing as Endeidis, so it is definitely a misspelling. Of what it is a misspelling would just be a guess. I tend to agree that Enteritis is most likely

You say that this is typewritten on a "death certificate" from 1895 in Lucas County, Ohio. This suggests that the scribe of that death certificate did not know what they were reading. I suggest you try to find another source for the cause of death, if one exists.

There are death registers for Lucas County, Ohio in FamilySearch's Ohio, County Death Records, 1840-2001. A quick perusal of the registers for around 1895 show that there is a column for cause of death. I suspect this is not the same source as you are referring to, since these registers are all handwritten. Therefore I suggest you search this dataset to see if you can find your ancestor, and compare the cause of death to the typewritten one.

Keep in mind that with death certificates and the like, there is often not just one copy or one version. Copies may have been made to give to the family, to give to the undertaker, to send to the probate courts, to file away in the archives. In some cases copies were made at a later date. Every time a record is copied or transcribed, there are opportunities for errors like "Endeidis" to slip in.

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  • Thanks for the link. I did find the death ledger, and it lists cause of death as Chronic Endeidis; the handwriting is pretty legible so the latter copy I had is correct.
    – Kometman
    Oct 27, 2016 at 2:40
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    @Kometman I'm fascinated by this since it seems to be a condition I have never come across before (nor, it seems, anyone else). Would you mind adding an image of the handwriting to the question? You don't need to include the individual's name or any details other than the cause of death, but an image would be immense help in interpreting this.
    – Harry V. ♦
    Oct 27, 2016 at 6:48

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