medialadj.n.
/ˈmiːdɪəl/, U.S. /ˈmidiəl/ A. adj.
1. † b. Of average or ordinary dimensions; (occasionally) of ordinary attainments, average. Obsolete.
a. Relating to a mathematical mean or average. Chiefly in medial line n. at Compounds. Now rare.
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the world > relative properties > number > arithmetic or algebraic operations > [adjective] > mean
meana1450
medial1570
subcontrary1914
1570 H. Billingsley tr. Euclid Elements Geom. x. f. 249v A right line therfore commensurable to a mediall line, is also a mediall line.
1704 J. Harris Lexicon Technicum I Alligation Medial, teaches how to find a Mean in the Price, Quantity, or Quality between the Extreams.
1811 J. Pinkerton Petralogy I. 345 According to a medial sum of many analyses.
1908 T. L. Heath tr. Euclid Elem. III. x. 50 A medial straight line..is so called because it is a mean proportional between two rational straight lines commensurable in square only.
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the world > relative properties > relationship > equality or equivalence > condition of being mean or average > [adjective] > average
meana1387
medium1670
middle1699
middling1762
medial1778
average1803
regular1890
1778 W. Marshall Minutes Agric. 18 Aug. 1775 The distance was medial—not half a mile.
1804 C. B. Brown tr. C. F. de Volney View Soil & Climate U.S.A. 113 The general or medial temperature of a country.
1830 C. Lyell Princ. Geol. I. 185 The united waters have only..a medial width of about three quarters of a mile.
1894 Harper's Mag. Jan. 273/2 Exceptional qualifications..are lacking to the medial man.
2. † c. Phonetics. Designating a (voiced) unaspirated stop. Cf. media n.1 1. Obsolete.
a. gen. Situated in a middle or intermediate position; middle; intermediate. Of a letter, sound, etc.: occurring in the middle of a word (cf. sense B. 1). medial to: situated in the middle of; intermediate between.
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society > communication > writing > written character > [adjective] > letter according to position
capitala1382
heada1387
final1530
initial1622
principial1625
subscript1683
mediala1749
superscript1793
adscript1812
epenthetic1831
epenthesized1880
non-final1896
1684 Arithmetica Apocalyptica in S. E. Answer Remarks Dr. H. More 358 I have here settled the true Epocha of the Medial-Visions, or of the Apostasie or Reign of Antichrist.
1721 N. Bailey Universal Etymol. Eng. Dict. Medial, belonging to the middle.
a1749 S. Boyse Vision of Patience in Poet. Wks. (1794) 346/1 Beneath the scorching of the medial line [i.e. the equator].
1807 F. Wrangham Serm. Transl. Script. 14 This province may be regarded as medial to Persia, Tartary, Tibet.
1824 J. Johnson Typographia II. xii. 309 The characters assume a different shape according to their situation, whether initial, medial, final, or single.
a1834 S. T. Coleridge Lit. Remains (1839) IV. 28 The understanding is in all respects a medial and mediate faculty, and has therefore two extremities or poles, the sensual..and the intellectual.
1881 J. Tyndall Ess. Floating Matter of Air 228 In regard to the supply of oxygen, there is a medial zone favourable to the play of vitality, beyond which, on both sides, life cannot exist.
1902 Encycl. Brit. XXV. 360/2 A great extension of Medial plains, stretching in moderate altitude from the Arctic Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico.
1983 B. Cottle Names v. 116 The British avoid two manipulations which are somewhat common in the United States: hyphenation of two first names, and the insertion of a medial initial.
1985 Christie's (N.Y.) Sale Catal.: Contents of Thorntree Mendham 11 June 63/1 A Federal Maple Washstand..with rectangular top over a medial shelf on square tapering legs.
b. Anatomy and Zoology. Situated in or relating to the median plane of the body or the midline of an organ; situated towards or nearer to the median plane. Frequently opposed to lateral. Frequently with to.
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1803 J. Barclay New Anat. Nomencl. 7 What I should call the proximal, medial, and distal phalanges.
1846 J. D. Dana U.S. Exploring Exped.: Zoophytes 284 A continuous medial line of large polyps, with others smaller, scattered on each side.
1880 A. Günther Introd. Study of Fishes 313 Medial and paired fins.
1925 Jrnl. Neurol. & Psychopathol. 6 5 We draw the conclusion that the upper part of the retina in apes is projected on the medial side of the corpus geniculatum externum.
1968 Brain 91 1 The subcorticospinal pathways have been grouped into medial and lateral systems.
1992 M. Leyner Et Tu, Babe (1993) Pref. 10 My agent has a supernumerary nipple below and slightly medial to her right breast.
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the mind > language > linguistics > study of speech sound > speech sound > speech sound by manner > [adjective] > stop
mute1589
medial1833
middle1833
lene1841
stopped1874
1833 Penny Cycl. I. 379/2 The middle (or medial) letters, g, d, b.
3. Geology. With capital initial. In the terminology of W. D. Conybeare: designating the series of geological deposits between the submedial and supermedial deposits, corresponding to the Carboniferous series. Now historical.
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1822 W. D. Conybeare & W. Phillips Outl. Geol. Eng. & Wales i. iii. i. 333 This series of rocks is by some geologists referred to the floetz, by others to the transition class of the Wernerians: we have preferred instituting a particular order for its reception... For this order we have proposed the name of Medial.
1891 Bull. Geol. Soc. Amer. 2 17 Conybeare subdivided the ‘Transition and Secondary formations’ of Werner into orders, and his medial order was called the ‘Medial or Carboniferous order’.
2008 L. J. Chubb in S. K. Donovan Jamaican Rock Stars ii. 21/1 He referred to certain rocks as the Medial or Carboniferous class, a term which..was approximately equivalent to the Upper Paleozoic.
B. n.† 2. Phonetics. A (voiced) unaspirated stop; = media n.1 1. Obsolete.
1. A letter or sound (occasionally a syllable) occurring in the middle of a word, not at the beginning or end; (also) a distinctive written or printed form of a letter or sound used in such a position, e.g. in the Arabic and Syriac scripts.Cf. quot. 1824 at sense A. 2a; the adjective is more common than the noun.
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society > communication > writing > written character > [noun] > letter > letter according to position
final1627
initial1627
medial1776
subscript1804
superscript1804
superfix1814
lettrine1891
1776 J. Richardson Gram. Arabick Lang. 17 The initial of the first, a medial of the second, and the final of the third [letter] are generally taken.
1817 H. T. Colebrooke Algebra Dissert. p. xii Diophantus employs the inverted medial of ἔλλειψις, defect or want..to indicate a negative quantity. He prefixes that mark ? to the quantity in question.
1962 Speculum 37 71 Long insular and low insular s are used: the first initially and medially, but not finally; the second for all finals, and for a few initials and medials.
1970 Stud. in Renaissance 17 60 In ¶2-16 his focus is on first syllables, in ¶17-18 on medials, and in ¶19-27 on finals.
1986 Canad. Jrnl. Ling. 31 254 To posit a medial sequence /iu/ or /jw/ as a possible medial adds unacceptably to the complexity of Mandarin syllable structure.
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the mind > language > linguistics > study of speech sound > speech sound > speech sound by manner > [noun] > obstruent > stop > voiced
medial1833
media1841
voice stop1844
middle1871
1833 Penny Cycl. I. 380/2 The three medials, β, γ, δ.
1848 E. Guest in Proc. Philol. Soc. 3 174 Three medials, as they are called b, g, d.
1873 J. Earle Philol. Eng. Tongue (ed. 2) Introd. 5 If the Classical word begins with an aspirate, the English word begins with a medial.
Compounds
medial accent n. Music (in plainsong) a fall of a minor third from the dominant (see quot. 1879).
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1879 T. Helmore Plain Song 105 The Medial Accent is the fall of a minor third from the dominant or reciting note.
medial area n. Mathematics the area equal to the square on a medial straight line (only with reference to or in translations of Euclid's work).
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1908 T. L. Heath tr. Euclid Elem. III. x. 55 It is in the Porism that we have the first mention of a medial area. It is the area which is equal to the square on a medial straight line.
medial cadence n. Music (now rare) a cadence in which the leading chord is inverted; (in plainsong and modal polyphony) a cadence which is not on the final of the mode.
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1809 J. W. Callcott Musical Gram. (ed. 2) 221 When the leading Harmony of any Cadence is not radical, but inverted, the Cadence is, in this Work, termed Medial, and is used to express an incomplete Close.
1880 G. Grove Dict. Music II. 243/1 In Plain Chaunt Melodies, the Medial Cadence sometimes leads to a close so satisfactory that it almost sounds final.
1991 Jrnl. Royal Mus. Assoc. 116 176 These points of closure are set off from one another by medial cadences on g and e.
medial consonances n. [after German mittlere Consonanz (1870 in the passage translated in quot. 1885)] Music (now rare) a name for the major sixth and major third (see quot. 1885).
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1885 A. J. Ellis tr. H. L. F. von Helmholtz On Sensations of Tone (ed. 2) 194 The major Sixth and the major Third, which may be called medial consonances.
medial lemniscus n. Anatomy and Zoology a bundle of nerve fibres on each side of the brain, originating in the gracile and cuneate nuclei of the posterior column of the spinal cord and ascending to the ventral posterior nucleus of the thalamus.
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1890 J. S. Billings National Med. Dict. II. 44/1 Lemniscus medialis or superior.]
1907 I. Hardesty in H. Morris & J. P. McMurrich Human Anat. (ed. 4) vi. 820 The medial lemniscus arises in the medulla oblongata from the nuclei (of termination) of the funiculus gracilis and funiculus cuneatus of the opposite side.
1974 D. Webster & M. Webster Compar. Vertebr. Morphol. xii. 278 Like the ventral spinothalamic tract, with which it is confluent, the lateral spinothalamic tract joins the medial lemniscus in the brainstem.
1993 Neuroradiology 35 327 The corticospinal and parietopontine tracts, lateral and medial lemnisci, superior and inferior cerebellar peduncles, [etc.] gave high signal and were directly visualised.
medial line n. (a) Mathematics a line that is the geometric mean (mean proportional) between two lines whose lengths are incommensurable, but the squares of which are commensurable (only with reference to or in translations of Euclid's work); (b) gen. a line through the middle of something; (c) Anatomy and Zoology = median line n. at median n.2 and adj.2 Compounds.
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the world > relative properties > number > geometry > line > [noun] > other
medial line1570
radius1590
lineature1630
foot line1658
rectification1685
axis1734
slant side1824
radiant1842
transverse1867
median1883
bilinear1923
1570Mediall line [see sense A. 1a].
1727 E. Chambers Cycl. at Bimedial When two medial lines..are compounded.
1846 J. D. Dana U.S. Exploring Exped.: Zoophytes 284 A continuous medial line of large polyps, with others smaller, scattered on each side.
1870 G. Rolleston Forms Animal Life 141 Along the medial line of each radial avenue.
1910 Encycl. Brit. I. 729/1 The series and the position within the series of the letter indicated, were each represented by straight strokes, the strokes for the series being shorter than those for the runes or the series being represented by strokes to the left the runes by strokes to the right of a medial line.
1922 J. Joyce Ulysses iii. xvii. [Ithaca] 663 He unbuttoned successively in reversed direction waistcoat, trousers, shirt and vest along the medial line of irregular..black hairs.
1968 Jrnl. Animal Ecol. 37 497 Sometimes there is a paler medial line in the fascia [of Acleris comariana].
medial malleolus n. Anatomy a rounded process on the medial side of the distal end of the tibia, forming the prominence of the inner aspect of the ankle; see malleolus n. 3.
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1909 D. J. Cunningham Text-bk. Anat. (ed. 3) 233 Medially there is a down-projecting process, called the medial malleolus, the medial aspect at which is subcutaneous and forms the projection of the inner ankle.
1949 H. Bailey Demonstr. Physical Signs Clin. Surg. (ed. 11) xxvii. 335 Find the tip of the medial malleolus on each side, and mark the point with a blue skin pencil.
1999 Jrnl. Foot & Ankle Surg. 38 420 The author reports a case of a fractured medial malleolus with a completely disrupted deltoid ligament following a pronation injury.
medial moraine n. a deposit between two conjoining glaciers.
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1841 L. Agassiz in Rep. Brit. Assoc. Advancem. Sci. 1840 Notices & Abstr. 114 Ridges on the sides of the ice..called lateral moraines. As these descend into lower valleys, they assume a central place on the moving ice, and are called medial moraines.
1925 N. E. Odell in E. F. Norton et al. Fight for Everest: 1924 315 The medial moraine from the north-east shoulder of Everest, carried englacially.
1970 R. J. Small Study of Landforms xii. 385 Much of the detritus on the valley floor has evidently been derived from a medial moraine.
medial straight line n. Mathematics = medial line n. (only with reference to or in translations of Euclid's work).
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1908Medial straight line [see sense A. 1a].
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2001; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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adj.n.1570