medio-
(ˈmiːdɪəʊ)
used as combining form of L. medius middle:
1. In Zool. and Bot. in various adjs. descriptive of parts and organs of animals and plants, with the sense either ‘relating to the middle of’ (an organ or part), as in medio-carpal, medio-colic, medio-digital, medio-dorsal (hence medio-dorsally adv.), medio-frontal (also absol. = ‘medio-frontal suture’), medio-lateral (hence medio-laterally adv.), medio-occipital, medio-palatine (also absol. = ‘medio-palatine bone’), medio-pontine, medio-stapedial (absol. in quots.), medio-tarsal, medio-ventral; or ‘in the middle’, as in medio-depressed, medio-perforate; also in medio-inferior, -posterior = ‘lower middle’, ‘posterior-middle’ (margin).
| 1890 Syd. Soc. Lex., *Medio-carpal, relating to the middle of the carpus. |
| 1871 W. A. Leighton Lichen-Flora 78 Subpeltate, *medio-depressed, margin white crenulate [etc.]. |
| 1852 Dana Crust. i. 625 Species with a *medio-dorsal spine. |
| 1882 Vines Sachs' Bot. 449 The first leaf is the scutiform leaf..which is placed *medio-dorsally. |
| 1865 Thurnam in Nat. Hist. Rev. Apr. 246 The almost infallible closure of the *medio-frontal. |
| 1849 Dana Geol. App. i. (1850) 698 [The] straight *medio-inferior margin, parallel with the dorsal. |
| 1854 Owen Skel. & Teeth in Circ. Sci., Org. Nat. I. 214 The *medio-lateral pieces as..developments of the ribs. |
| 1971 Nature 20 Aug. 542/2 The nucleus is crescent shaped in cross section and extends 1·4 mm rostrocaudally and *mediolaterally. |
| 1890 Syd. Soc. Lex., *Medio-occipital, relating to the middle of the occipital region. |
| 1884 Coues Key N. Amer. Birds (ed. 2) 173 The most marked *medio-palatine ossification... Such are..formations which, like the medio-palatine, serve to bind the palate halves together. |
| 1879 W. A. Leighton Lichen-Flora (ed. 3) 516 *Medio-perforate, perforated in the centre. |
| 1890 Syd. Soc. Lex., *Medio-pontine, relating to the middle of the pons varolii. |
| 1852 Dana Crust. i. 625 *Medio-posterior spine small, very remote from posterior margin. |
| 1875 W. K. Parker in Encycl. Brit. III. 702/2 The bar itself is the ‘*medio-stapedial’..; it will soon segment itself off from the ear-capsule. 1890 Syd. Soc. Lex., Medio-stapedial, the middle third of the columella of the ear in the frog. |
| 1884 Coues Key N. Amer. Birds (ed. 2) 121 note, A bird's ankle-joint is..between proximal and distal series of tarsal bones, and therefore *medio-tarsal as in reptiles. |
| 1870 Rolleston Anim. Life Introd. 40 Reflected upwards from the *medio-ventral line. |
2. In
Philol., as
medio-palatal a., articulated with the tongue against the middle part of the hard palate;
medio-passive a., of the voice of a verb, intermediate between active and passive (
cf. middle a. 4 a); also as
n.; hence
medio-passivization.
| 1902 E. W. Scripture Elem. Exper. Phonetics xvii. 297 Roof articulations are indicated by the names..pre-, medio-, postpalatal. 1942 Bloch & Trager Outl. Ling. Analysis 15 Different points of articulation are designated by the terms prepalatal, mediopalatal, and postpalatal, indicating that the front [of the tongue] touches or approaches respectively the anterior, the middle, or the posterior part of the hard palate. 1949 R.-M. S. Heffner Gen. Phonetics vi. 148 In Midwest American pronunciations of English there is an open r sound, which is formed by raising the middle region of the dorsum of the tongue towards the mediopalatal junction between the hard palate and velum. 1962 Chavarria-Aguila & Penzl in Householder & Saporta Probl. Lexicogr. iv. 241 A contrasting pair of voiced and voiceless medio-palatal fricatives occur. |
| 1921 E. Sapir Lang. iv. 74 Of the seven suffixes..-o(ht) -indicates activity done for the subject (the so-called ‘middle’ or ‘medio-passive’ voice of Greek). 1933 E. H. Sturtevant Compar. Gram. Hittite Lang. vi. 250 Hittite has a medio-passive, which has the same uses as the Gk. middle voice. It most frequently represents the subject as acting upon or in respect of himself. 1934 Priebsch & Collinson German Lang. ii. vi. 296 Germanic retained in Gothic an inflected medio-passive present from Indo-European. 1952 O. R. Gurney Hittites vi. 118 The verb has two voices—active and medio⁓passive. 1968 Encycl. Brit. XI. 558/1 Besides the active there survives a medio-passive voice [in Hittite] characterized in the present by a somewhat loose -r(i) attached to the old middle endings. 1972 Language XLVIII. 393 A reflexive—hence, by ergative criteria, mediopassive—form of the verb. Ibid. 395 In keeping with the ergative focus, the object (non-ergator) is retained formally in an intransitive, mediopassive form, there being no external agent of the action described. 1973 A. H. Sommerstein Sound Pattern Anc. Greek ii. 13 The infinitive ending in all medio-passive senses is /-st{suph}ay/. 1975 Language LI. 97 Ambiguity between reflexive and medio-passive constructions is possible (e.g. ‘I got out’ vs. ‘I cut myself’); but in practice this is not much of a problem, since many verbs do not undergo medio-passivization. |