Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. The sphenoid bone.
- adj. Wedge-shaped.
- adj. Of or relating to the sphenoid bone.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Wedge-shaped; wedge-like: specifically, in anatomy, noting certain cranial bones. See II., 2.
- n. In crystallography, a wedge-shaped crystalline form contained under four equal isosceles triangles. It is the hemihedral form of square pyramid of the tetragonal system.
- n. In anatomy, a large and important compound bone of the skull: so called from its shape and connections in man. The cranial articulations are with the occipital, temporal, parietal, frontal, and ethmoid; the facial, with the vomer, malar, palate, and sometimes the superior maxillary. It has a solid median and inferior body, and bears on each side two pairs of wings, greater and lesser, separated by the sphenoidal fissure from each other. It is a collection of bones, not a single bone, its composition including, in man and the mammals generally.
- n. By some authors the term is limited to a form having two faces only, which meet in a wedge-shaped edge. The combination of two complementary forms of this type is then called a bisphenoid. A tetragonal scalenohedron, a form having eight similar triangular faces arranged in symmetrical pairs, has been called a disphenoid.
- n. In anthropology, a cranium the norma verticalis of which has a wedge-shaped form, the forehead being narrow and the greatest width being near the occiput.
Wiktionary
- adj. Wedge-shaped.
- n. anatomy The sphenoid bone.
- n. crystallography A wedge-shaped crystal bounded by four equal isosceles triangles; the hemihedral form of square pyramid.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Wedge-shaped.
- adj. (Anat.) Of or pertaining to the sphenoid bone.
- n. (Crystallog.) A wedge-shaped crystal bounded by four equal isosceles triangles. It is the hemihedral form of square pyramid.
- n. (Anat.) The sphenoid bone.
WordNet 3.0
- n. butterfly-shaped bone at the base of the skull
Examples
“The orbital plate and that part of the sphenoid which is found in the temporal fossa, as well as the lateral pterygoid plate, are ossified in membrane (Fawcett) 34.”
“The third through the left sphenoid bone, the fourth through the left temporal bone.”
“One was a LOMFDGB little old man fall down and go boom with a nasty 4cm nonlinear laceration on his sphenoid.”
“Since 1998, every MRI I've had for a brain tumor has also shown an abnormal sphenoid sinus fluid level which accounts neatly for my thrice yearly sinus/cold/bronchitis problems.”
“You know that there is a disease called giantism, caused by ‘a certain morbid process in the sphenoid bone of the skull — viz., an excessive development of the anterior lobe of the pituitary body’ (this is from the nearest encyclopedia).”
“Some student in the rhinology department had taken out the turbinates in his nose—and the whole rhinology department, judging from the notes, had taken turns finding and irrigating his sphenoid sinuses—the most difficult sinuses in the human head to reach.”
“The bullet had entered through the left temple, burning and splitting the skin and singeing Grace's hair above the wound, and shattering the sphenoid bone.”
“Through the newly drilled hole in the sphenoid bone, Yarborough introduced the needle tip.”
“With the image on the screen to guide him, Yarborough began to drill through bone, the bit whining through the floor of the sphenoid bone.”
“Crushing blows to the frontal, parietal, sphenoid and supraorbital.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘sphenoid’.
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phrontistery-s
from phrontistery.info
syzygy, systyle, systematology, systatic, syssitia, syrtic, systaltic, syrt, syrinx, syphilomania, syphilology, syntrierarch and 1593 more...
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Anatomically Correct
canthus, vibrissa, femoral, sphenoid, dura mater, pia mater, epiglottis, glottis, mons veneris, plaque, tibia, ulna and 96 more...
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Human Anatomy
Terms relating to the human body, primarily in osteology.
humerus, scapula, ulna, radius, maxilla, mandible, mandible, occipital bone, parietal bone, frontal bone, tibia, talus and 104 more...
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liminal words
transformational, entryway words: thresh(hold), fresh relief
liminal, sill, threshold, aletheia, inscape, adit, introit, maze, pore, porism, portal, port and 114 more...
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Not Quite As Awful As They Sound
masticate, absquatulate, adumbrate, afflatus, fetial, anile, bilabial, cineaste, smew, copse, piebald, testudinate and 156 more...
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...:::bella:::...
originally started as an attempt to collect words I found visually and auditorially beautiful, as well as psychically evocative, this has become nothing more than a grab bag of word curiosities, a ...
bergamot, jambalaya, bee's knees, heliotrope, hosanna, gamboge, aureole, filial, madrigal, multilingual, sacrosanct, sojourn and 1072 more...
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A Serving of Random Palavery
This is an eclectic and somewhat random list of words that catch and hold my attention. They may be archaic or disused, dialectal, jargon words from my fields of academic speciality (linguistics, ...
scraffle, infelicitous, misprize, defrock, caitiff, gimcrack, innerve, abjure, cyberchondriac, indurate, hexagynous, pistils and 146 more...
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April 2010
ructus, eructation, emesis, merycism, cachexia, copremesis, fistula, hydrocephalus, glottis, afferent, efferent, bleb and 27 more...
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ossified
frontal, parietal, temporal, occipital, nasal, zygomatic, ethmoid, maxilla, sphenoid, mandible, cervical, thoracic and 22 more...
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Anthrolocution
Work-related words.. It can have anything to do with human anatomy, linguistics, academic social structures, or archaeological artefacts.
mastoid process, formative, bioarchaeology, external auditory..., zygomatic, squamous, osteology, core-periphery po..., hegemony, niche, epicondyle, iliac and 61 more...
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Wedge-shaped
Words meaning wedge-shaped
Tweets
Looking for tweets for sphenoid.
hernesheir (adj): wedge-shaped, Mod. L. sphenoides < Gk. sphenoeides
(n): in mineralogy, any wedge-shaped crystal form with four triangular faces.
Now go try to draw a solid 3-D representation of one that shows all 4 faces! Dec 31, 2008