odontoid, a. and n.
(əʊˈdɒntɔɪd)
[ad. Gr. ὀδοντοειδής tooth-like: see odonto- and -oid. Cf. F. odontoïde (1690 in Hatz.-Darm.).]
A. adj.
1. Resembling or having the form of a tooth; tooth-like; spec. in odontoid process (odontoid peg), a tooth-like projection from the body of the axis or second cervical vertebra of certain mammals and birds; when this process does not coalesce with the body of the axis, as in Ornithorhynchus and many reptiles, it is sometimes called the odontoid bone.
| 1819 Pantologia, Odontoid Process, a process of the second vertebra of the neck. 1831 R. Knox Cloquet's Anat. 179 The posterior surface of this ligament rests upon the odontoid process. 1872 Mivart Elem. Anat. 217 In many animals we have a distinct ‘odontoid’ bone, instead of an odontoid process. 1872 Huxley Phys. vii. 171 The skull does not move upon the atlas, but the atlas slides round the odontoid peg of the axis vertebra. |
2. (attrib. use of B.) Of or belonging to the odontoid process, as odontoid ligament, odontoid tubercle.
| 1840 G. V. Ellis Anat. 277 The odontoid or check ligaments are two strong, round, fibrous processes, about half an inch long, attached, below, to the apex and sides of the odontoid process. 1892 Syd. Soc. Lex., Odontoid tubercle, a rough elevation on the inner border of each condyle of the occipital bone for the attachment of the alar odontoid ligament. |
B. n. The odontoid process.
| [1706 Phillips, Odontoides (in Anat.), a Part shap'd like a tooth; as The Tooth of the second Vertebra..and of some other Bones.] 1854 Owen Skel. & Teeth in Circ. Sc., Organ. Nat. I. 217 The rest of the body of the atlas, or ‘odontoid’, has coalesced with its proper neural arch. 1896 Newton Dict. Birds 852 The intervertebral pad connecting the Odontoid with the body of the Axis. |