branchial
adjective
Word History
borrowed from New Latin branchiālis, from Latin branchia "gills" (borrowed from Greek bránchia, of uncertain origin) + -ālis -al entry 1
Note: Greek bránchia is conventionally taken to be from the base of bránchos "hoarseness, sore throat" (as by Frisk, Griechisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch), though the semantic connection is not entirely self-evident, and bránchos is in its turn linked with brónchos "windpipe, throat," though there is no explanation for the change in vowel. If the glosses brachṓdēs: trachýs ("rough, harsh") and brakías: tracheîs tópous ("rough places") in the lexicon of the Greek grammarian Hesychius are relevant, the set of alternations brak-/brach-/branch- suggests pre-Greek substratum (see E. Furnée, Die wichtigsten Konsonantischen Erscheinungen des Vorgriechischen [Mouton, 1972], pp. 128, 276). In the case of all these words both form and meaning may be affected by folk etymology.
1729, in the meaning defined above
Medical Definition
branchial
adjective
- primariness
- primary
- primary accent
- primary air
- primary alphabet
- primary atypical pneumonia
- primary battery
- primary benefit
- primary body
- primary body cavity
- primary burial
- primary care
- primary cause
- primary cell
- primary circle
- primary color
- primary colors
- primary commercial blanket bond
- primary constriction
- primary consumer
- primary covert
- primary deposit
- primary derivative
- primary endosperm nucleus
- primary explosive