Medicine & BodyGreek → English
Ethmoid
/ˈɛθmɔɪd/noun
The light, perforated bone between the eye sockets that forms the roof of the nasal cavity.
The Greek roots
ἠθμός
ēthmós
sieve, strainer
εἶδος
eîdos
form, shape
Literally: “sieve-shaped”
The story of the word
The bone behind the bridge of the nose is drilled with small holes so the olfactory nerves can pass through, and Greek anatomists called it ἠθμοειδές, sieve-shaped. Latin anatomy then said the same thing again in its own language, calling the perforated plate cribriform from cribrum, a sieve, so the skull carries the strainer twice over. Smell depends entirely on those holes, which is why a hard blow to the face can cost someone their sense of taste.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → modern Latin → English
- First recorded
- 18th century
Same family
thyroiddeltoidkaleidoscopeidol
In a sentence
The scan showed a fracture running through the ethmoid.
Surgeons reach the pituitary through the nose and the ethmoid air cells.