Osculant

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Touching or kissing; characterized by close contact or connection between two things
2. Mutually tangent or in contact at a single point, as curves or surfaces that meet without crossing
3. Having the quality of meeting and adhering closely together while maintaining a shared point of tangency

Etymology: "Osculant" comes from Latin "osculans", the present participle of "osculari", meaning "to kiss." The Latin verb itself derives from "osculum", a diminutive of "os", "mouth", so the word's core idea is a little kiss, or more literally a small mouth brought up against another. Its English relatives include "osculate", the verb for kissing or coming into close contact, and the adjective is simply the form that describes things in that state. The sense has moved from the physical to the figurative. In its original use, the word described actual lips meeting, but English writers came to apply it to any close contact or intimate joining between two things. Today it is most often found in technical writing, where it describes curves or surfaces that touch at a point or along a line without crossing, a use that keeps the image of two things meeting closely.