Frantic means wild with hurry, worry or fear. A frantic search, frantic with worry, frantic activity.
It describes disorganised urgency: frantic activity is busy and not necessarily productive. Frantic with is the construction for the emotion causing it. Note frantically, which is common before verbs of searching and waving; and that frantic and frenzy come from the same Greek word for inflammation of the brain, which is a considerably stronger origin than the modern use of either.
1adjectivefranticWild with hurry, worry or fear.
“The mother was frantic when she couldn't find her child in the crowded shop.”
synonyms: desperate, frenzied
frantic is a state of wild urgency.
Also accepted in games: desperate
Greek phrenitis meant inflammation of the brain, from phren, the mind. Frantic and frenetic are the same word borrowed twice, and frenzy is a third form of it.
Latin
phreneticus
Old French
frenetique
Middle English
frantike
English, today
frantic
Built from
From Middle English frantike, frentik, variant of frenetik, from Old French frenetique, from Latin phreneticus, alteration of phreniticus, from φρενιτικός (“mad, suffering from inflammation of the brain”), from φρενῖτις (“inflammation of the brain”), from φρήν (“the brain”). a doublet of frenetic and phrenitic.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA