ethmoid, a. and n. Anat.
(ˈɛθmɔɪd)
Also 9 erron. æthmoid.
[ad. Gr. ἠθµοειδής sieve-like, ‘cribriform’ (Galen has ἠθµοειδὲς ὀστοῦν ethmoid bone), f. ἠθµός sieve: see -oid. Cf. Fr. ethmoïde.]
A. adj. Sieve-like, finely perforated. ethmoid bone: a square-shaped cellular bone, situated between the two orbits, at the root of the nose, containing many perforations, through which the olfactory nerves pass to the nose.
| 1741 Monro Anat. (ed. 3) 80 Joined to the Ethmoid Bone. 1831 R. Knox Cloquet's Anat. 583 It dives into the posterior ethmoid cells. 1854 Owen in Circ. Sc. (c 1865) II. 90/1 Parts of the olfactory capsules..forming the compound bone called ‘æthmoid.’ |
B. quasi-n. passing into n. = ethmoid bone.
| 1842 Col. H. Smith Nat. Library xiii. 87 The cranium..may be subdivided into three compartments, the anterior containing the two frontal bones and the æthmoid. 1851 Richardson Geol. viii. 313 The 3rd the ethmoid with the two frontal. 1858 Geikie Hist. Boulder vii. 121 The eye orbits seem to have been at the corners of the intermaxillary, circumscribed by the sub-orbitals and the ethmoids. |
Hence
ethˈmoidal a. (
a) Of or pertaining to the ethmoid bone. (
b)
= ethmoid.
| a. 1741 Monro Anat. (ed. 3), The Ethmoidal and Sphenoidal [Sutures] surround the Bones of these Names. 1831 R. Knox Cloquet's Anat. 47 On each side of the ethmoidal notch, there is observed a triangular concave surface. 1842 E. Wilson Anat. Vade-m. 281 Ethmoidal arteries pass through the ethmoidal foramina. |
| b. 1764 Hadley in Phil. Trans. LIV. 4 The superior maxillary, sphenoïdal and ethmoïdal bones were broken away. 1849 E. Blyth Cuvier's Anim. K. 39 The cranium subdivides into three portions: the anterior is formed by the two frontal and the ethmoidal bones. |