a. [f. Lat. type *ex(s)pīrātōrius, f. ex(s)pīrāre: see EXPIRE v. and -ORY.] Of or pertaining to the process of expiration.
1847. in Craig.
1861. T. Graham, Pract. Med., 294. The expiratory [murmur] is … distinctly audible under the clavicles.
1866. Huxley, Physiol., iv. (1872), 90. Whenever a violent expiratory effort is made, the walls of the abdomen are obviously flattened.
1878. M. Foster, Physiol., II. ii. § 1. 263. They are in fact the chief expiratory muscles.
b. Gram. (Often spelt exspiratory.) In Expiratory accent, a kind of accent consisting in variation of stress, as distinguished from that which consists in variation of pitch.
