Thanks! Glad you liked it. A fellow word nut, eh? I love etymology (and folk etymology – I think there’s a bit of both in the article 🙂 ) – there may be more to come…

So your Spring fever (vårtrötheten) preceeds your hay fever? That’s an argument for the two things not actually being the same. So much for that theory!
🙂

Glad you liked the third hand! 🙂

I agree, allergies didn’t seem so common when we were young… but they were certainly present in my family because my sister used to have terrible reactions, especially to grass. She would turn red, her face would swell and she would gasp for air (and panic). The first time I remember she was 3 or 4 (I was 6). The doctors tell me I’m probably genetically predisposed and became sensitised in ’93 just because there was so much pollen in the air.

I edited the English in a doctoral thesis, some while back now, for a medical doctor who had done comparative research into allergies in Sweden, Poland and the Baltic States. As I recall, one of his tentative conclusions was that modern cleanliness indoors may be a contributing factor. And who knows, the chemicals we modern humans have introduced into our food, water and air may have something to do with it too.

But it could also be a social phenomenon. That we in our society are more willing to recognise allergies now than we used too be, and more prepared to talk about our allergic reactions. Earlier, we were all supposed to keep a stiff upper lip (or whatever the Swedish equivalent is) and only the people like my poor sister who were completely prostrated by their allergies got any sympathy.