a. and sb. [ad. med.L. linguāl-is, f. lingua tongue. Cf. F. lingual.]
A. adj.
† 1. Tongue-shaped (see quot.). Obs.
c. 1400. Lanfranc’s Cirurg., 308. The .ix. cauterie is clepid linguale [L. cauterium linguale]. Ibid., 309. Superfluite of fleisch þat is vpon a mannes browis, þou schalt do awei wiþ a cauterie þat is clepid lingual, schape as it were a tunge of a brid.
2. Chiefly Anat. and Zool. Of or pertaining to the tongue, or to any tongue-like part (see LINGUA 1).
Lingual artery, a branch of the external carotid, supplying the tongue. Lingual bone, the hyoid bone (Syd. Soc. Lex., 1889). Lingual nerve, a tactile and sensory nerve (a branch of the inferior maxillary division of the fifth cranial pair), supplying the tongue. Lingual ribbon, in mollusks, = ODONTOPHORE. Lingual teeth, the chitinous band of teeth which is borne upon the odontophore.
1650. Bulwer, Anthropomet., 143. There are men somewhere who have really a double Tongue, with which they better perform the lingual offices then we do with one.
1826. Kirby & Sp., Entomol., III. xxxiv. 426. The labial palpi … might with equal propriety be denominated lingual palpi.
1831. R. Knox, Cloquet’s Anat., 287. The constrictor medius is covered, in its outer surface, by the hyo-glossus and lingual artery externally.
1848. Carpenter, Anim. Phys., 379. The branch of this proceeding to the tongue, is known as the lingual nerve.
1851–6. Woodward, Mollusca, iv. 28. The lingual ribbon of the limpet is longer than the whole animal.
1858. Owen, in Murchison, Siluria, App. (1859), 562. Lingual teeth of gasteropods.
1862. J. G. Jeffreys, Brit. Conchol., I. 289. The tongue or lingual plate of Cochlicopa.
1880. Günther, Fishes, 65. The lingual cartilage is large in all cyclostomes.
1880. R. Rimmer, Land & Freshwater Shells, 23. Central lingual tooth minute.
1882. Tryon, Conchol., I. 94. At the lower posterior end is situated the lingual sheath, enclosing the odontophore.
3. Phonetics. Of sounds: Formed by the tongue.
As a term of phonetic classification, the word has been very variously applied: e.g., by Wilkins to most of the vowels, and to all the consonants exc. the labials and gutturals; some have appropriated it to the ‘divided’ sounds, l and r. In present use, it hardly survives exc. as a synonym for CEREBRAL (e.g., in Whitney’s Sanskrit Grammar, 1879).
1668. Wilkins, Real Char., III. xiv. § 2. 374. Then u, o, [char.], should be first, as being Labial, and α, a, e, ι, next, as Lingual, or Linguapalatal, and y last, as being Guttural.
1773. W. Kenrick, Dict., Rhet. Gram., § 2. 3. He would be at no loss to perceive, that the guttural and nasal modes of enunciation are less pleasant than the labial and lingual.
1860. O. W. Holmes, Elsie V. (1861), 167. Not a lisp, certainly, but the least possible imperfection in articulating some of the lingual sounds.
4. a. Pertaining to the tongue as the organ of speech. b. Pertaining to language or languages.
1774. Westm. Mag., II. 456. I was advised to take a country lodging for the benefit of the air; but as a lingual noise is not the only one I dislike, I was for ever changing my situation.
1813. T. Busby, Lucretius, II. V. 1311. If others yet no language knew, Then, tell me, whence their lingual talent grew.
1822–34. Good’s Study Med. (ed. 4), I. 415. He [a tongueless boy] underwent a strict examination as to … the lingual powers he still possessed.
1837. Carlyle, Fr. Rev., II. I. ii. One great difference between our two kinds of civil war; between the modern lingual or Parliamentary-logical kind, and the ancient or manual kind in the steel battle-field.
1855. J. Wilson, in Mitchell, Mem. R. Nesbit (1858), 396. His lingual studies in India were almost altogether confined to the Marathi and to the elements of Sanskrit.
1871. Blackie, Four Phases, I. 79. Your talk is not a mere exhibition of lingual dexterity; it means something.
1873. Contemp. Rev., XXI. 928. The lingual ingenuities of logic.
B. sb. 1. A lingual sound (see A. 3).
1668. Wilkins, Real Char., III. xiv. § 2. 374. In conformity with the common Alphabets, I begin [in enumerating the vowels] with the Linguals.
a. 1709. W. Baxter, Lett., in Gloss. Rom. Antiq. (1731), 409. The second Sort I call Linguals, which are proper to Mankind, and borrowed by Imitation from animal and other Sounds.
1817. Duponceau, in Trans. Amer. Philos. Soc. (1818), I. 261. Four linguals, zhim, shal, zed, and sin.
1871. W. A. Hammond, Dis. Nerv. System, 36. The linguals and labials among letters are particularly troublesome.
2. Anat. The lingual nerve (see A. 2).
1877. M. Foster, Physiol., III. i. 345. Here the sensory lingual was evidently the means of causing motor effects.
