Pl. -ia. Also anglicized synange. [mod.L., f. Gr. σύν SYN- + ἀγγεῖον vessel.]
1. Anat. and Zool. A collective or common blood-vessel from which several arteries branch; spec. the terminal part of the arterial trunk in the lower vertebrates.
1875. Huxley, in Encycl. Brit., I. 763/1. Pylangium and synangium, together, are the equivalents of that portion of the heart which lies between the ventricle and the anterior wall of the pericardium.
1875. Huxley & Martin, Elem. Biol. (1877), 176. The terminal part common to the divergent trunks is the synangium.
2. Bot. The oblong mass of coherent sporangia in ferns of the order Marattiaceæ.
1881. J. S. Gardner, in Nature, 13 Oct., 560/1. In the later Carboniferous, Marattioid ferns for the first time occur with the sporangia united in a composite organ called a synangium.
1893. Bower, in Phil. Trans., B. CLXXXV. 542. It is difficult to recognize … the exact limits of the sporogenous masses in the synangia.
Hence Synagial, Synangic adjs., pertaining to or constituting a synangium.
1875. Huxley, in Encycl. Brit., I. 765/1. Three thick semilunar valves are placed at the ventricular end of this region, and three others, also of unequal dimensions, at its synangial end.
1902. C. Reid Ibid., XXXI. 417/1. Numerous … fern-sporangia occur in the petrified material of the Carboniferous formation; the presence of an annulus is a frequent character…, while synangic sori are rare. Ibid. The genus Diplolabis of Renault … resembles Corynepteris in possessing a synangic fructification.
