Hyoid

//ˈhaɪ.ɔɪd// adj, noun

adj, noun ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    Ellipsis of hyoid bone. abbreviation, alt-of, ellipsis

    "the vulture, relinquishing its title, surely in natural justice gave me a right to this femur, this curiously distorted hyoid?"

  2. 2
    a U-shaped bone at the base of the tongue that supports the tongue muscles wordnet
  3. 3
    A curved line resembling the English uppercase letter U.
Adjective
  1. 1
    Shaped like a U, or like the letter upsilon (υ). not-comparable

    "This stick has a hyoid shape."

  2. 2
    Of or pertaining to the hyoid bone. not-comparable, relational
Adjective
  1. 1
    of or relating to the hyoid bone wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
hyalhyoid bonehyoidalhyoidealhyoideanhypsiloid

Example

More examples

"The hyoid bone in her throat flutters as if discharging some subvocal rosary."

Etymology

Borrowing from French hyoïde, from New Latin hȳoīdēs, from Ancient Greek ῡ̔οειδής (hūoeidḗs, “shaped like the letter "υ"”), from ὖ (û, “the Greek letter upsilon”) + -ο- (-o-) + -ειδής (-eidḗs, “-like, -oid”).

Related phrases

hyoid archhyoid bonehyoid bone

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.