ligament
(ˈlɪgəmənt)
[ad. L. ligāment-um, f. ligāre to bind.]
† 1. Anything used in binding or tying; a band, tie; Surg. a bandage, ligature. Obs. in lit. sense.
| 1599 A. M. tr. Gabelhouer's Bk. Physicke 344/1 Cut of linnen ligamentes the breadth of three fingers, grease them in this salve... Tye then these ligamentes theron. 1626 Bacon Sylva §66 The Prince of Aurange..could finde no meanes to stanch the Bloud, either by Medicine or Ligament. 1671 Grew Anat. Plants i. iii. App. §4 (1682) 27 The Gardener, with his Ligaments of Leather, secures the main Branches. 1735 J. Price Stone-Br. Thames 7 All the Work well cemented and join'd together with proper Ligaments. 1753 Hanway Trav. (1762) I. iii. i. 228 Their drawers..are more convenient than breeches..being without any tight ligaments. |
b. fig. Chiefly, a tie, bond of union.
| 1426 Lydg. De Guil. Pilgr. 22595 My boondes and my lygamentys Ben dyuerse comaundementys, To holden in subieccyoun ffolkes off relygyoun. 1596 Bell Surv. Popery iii. v. 280 The bishoppe of Rome..might have released or pardoned..such ligaments, mults, or canonicall corrections as he had inioyned to publike offenders. 1643 Sir T. Browne Relig. Med. i. §38, I have not those strait ligaments, or narrow obligations to the World, as to dote on life. 1762 Sterne Tr. Shandy VI. x, He looked up..in my uncle Toby's face; then cast a look upon his boy;—and that ligament, fine as it was,—was never broken. 1796 Burke Reg. Peace i. (1892) 70 The law of nations, the great ligament of mankind. 1841 Trench Parables xvii. (1877) 326 The Sacraments have been often called the ligaments for the wounds of the soul. 1850 Hawthorne Scarlet L. iv. (1852) 69, I find here a woman, a man, a child, amongst whom and myself there exist the closest ligaments. No matter whether of love or hate;..of right or wrong. |
2. Anat. One of the numerous short bands of tough, flexible, fibrous tissue which bind the bones of the body together. By extension applied to any membranous fold which supports an organ and keeps it in position.
| c 1400 Lanfranc's Cirurg. 20 Ne leeue we nouȝt þat ech brood ligament is a skyn, & ech round ligament to be a senewe. 1599 Massinger etc. Old Law i. i, I might have gently lost it in my cradle, Before my nerves and ligaments grew strong. 1741 Monro Anat. Bones (ed. 3) 213 The Ligament of the Thigh-bone, which is commonly..called the round one. 1802 Paley Nat. Theol. viii. 120 A..flexible ligament, inserted, by one end into the head of the ball, by the other into the bottom of the cup [of a ball and socket joint]; which ligament keeps the two parts of the joint..in their place. 1838 Dickens Nich. Nick. xxi, The ligament which unites the Siamese twins. 1858 Lewes Sea-side Stud. 275 To Goethe, bones and ligaments were not less beautiful and full of interest than flowers and streams. |
b. A similar part in lower organisms.
| 1797 Encycl. Brit. XIII. 537 A ligament placed at the summit of the [oyster] shell serves as an arm to its operations. 1802 Bingley Anim. Biog. (1813) I. 42 They [insects] are cut, as it were, into two parts. These parts are in general connected by a slender ligament or hollow thread. 1826 Kirby & Sp. Entomol. IV. 185 In those with a sessile one [sc. abdomen] the base is attached to the metaphragm by strong ligaments. |
c. spec. in Conch. The elastic substance which holds together the valves of a bivalve shell.
| 1816 T. Brown Elem. Conchol. 155 1837 Penny Cycl. VII. 433/1 To this hinge is superadded a ligament. 1851 Richardson Geol. viii. (1855) 242. 1875 Buckland Log-bk. 123 The ligament which holds the two shells together. |
3. Comb., as ligament-wise adv.
| 1615 Crooke Body of Man 389 These..are knit to the proper membrane of euery gristle by the interposition as it were of a Periostion Ligament-wise. |
Hence † ˈligament v. rare to bind together.
| 1658–9 Burton's Diary (1828) III. 210 There was great wisdom..in framing that oath; to ligament the single person and people together. |