Coronal

Part of speech: adjective

Pronunciation: /ˈkɒɹənəl/

Definitions

1. Pertaining to or resembling a crown or circular shape
2. Concerning or shaped like a crown ; situated at the upper or frontal part of the head ; describing sounds produced by raising the tongue tip or blade toward the roof of the mouth
3. Connected to or resembling a circular crown form ; located around the uppermost or anterior head area ; referring to speech sounds formed with the front part of the tongue raised

Etymology: "Coronal" traces back to the Latin "corōna," meaning a crown or garland, which Greek had earlier borrowed as "korōnē," meaning something curved or bent, such as a wreath or a crow's curved beak. The Latin adjective "corōnālis" meant "related to a crown," and it passed through Anglo-Norman into Middle English as "coronal," where it originally described things connected with crowns or garlands. The sense of "circular" or "resembling a crown" came later, and it is the sense that matters in modern anatomy and geology. Because the coronal suture runs across the top of the skull like a crown, anatomists applied the word to it, and the same logic lets it describe a plane that cuts the body from side to side, dividing front from back.

Synonyms: crown-like, circumferential, ring-like