sulcus

English

Lateral sulcus (fissure on the surface of the brain)

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin sulcus (“a furrow made by a plow”). Doublet of sullow ("plough").

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈsʌl.kəs/
• Rhymes: -ʌlkəs

Noun

sulcus (plural sulci)

1. (anatomy) A furrow or groove in an organ or a tissue, especially that marking the convolutions of the surface of the brain.
   • 1999, Thomas C. Pritchard, Kevin D. Alloway, Medical Neuroscience‎^[1], page 55:

     The largest sulcus, the longitudinal fissure, divides the brain into left and right hemispheres.

   • 2006, Inderbir Singh, Textbook of Human Neuroanatomy‎^[2], 7 edition, page 72:

     Unlike most other sulci, the lateral sulcus is very deep.

   • 2014, John Kiernan, Raj Rajakumar, Barr's The Human Nervous System: An Anatomical Viewpoint‎^[3], 10 edition, page 213:

     The large surface area of the human cerebral cortex results in a pattern of gyri and sulci.

   Synonym: fissure

   Coordinate term: gyrus

   Hyponyms: calcaneal sulcus, central sulcus, cingulate sulcus, coronal sulcus, cruciate sulcus, interlabial sulcus, intermammary sulcus, lacrimal sulcus, lateral sulcus, malleolar sulcus, postcentral sulcus, preauricular sulcus, precentral sulcus, radial sulcus, sagittal sulcus, sigmoid sulcus, sulcus ansatus, sulcus arteriae vertebralis, sulcus tubae auditivae, tympanic sulcus

2. (planetology) A region of subparallel grooves or ditches formed by a geological process.

Derived terms

• hemisulcus
• hyposulcus
• pseudosulcus
• sulcal
• sulcate

Translations

furrow or groove in an organ or a tissue

• Arabic: تَلَم m (talam)
• Bulgarian: вдлъбнатина (bg) f (vdlǎbnatina), бразда (bg) f (brazda)
• Czech: zářez (cs) m, rýha (cs) f, brázda f
• Esperanto: sulko (eo)
• Finnish: uurre (fi)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• German: Furche (de) f
• Hungarian: barázda (hu)
• Slovak: ryha f

groove on the surface of the brain

• Arabic: ثَلْم m (ṯalm)
• Bulgarian: мозъчна гънка f (mozǎčna gǎnka)
• Finnish: aivouurre
• Hungarian: barázda (hu), agybarázda (hu)
• Portuguese: sulco (pt) m
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: бра́зда f

  Roman: brázda (sh) f

• Spanish: surco (es) m

References

• “sulcus”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
• “sulcus”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.

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Latin

Etymology

From Proto-Italic *solkos, from Proto-Indo-European *solk-o-s (“furrow”), *selk- (“to pull, drag”), whence also Old English sulh. Doublet of holcus.

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈsul.kus/, [ˈs̠ʊɫ̪kʊs̠]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈsul.kus/, [ˈsulkus]

Noun

sulcus m (genitive sulcī); second declension

1. (agriculture) A furrow made by a plow.

   Synonyms: līra, porca

2. (transferred sense):
   1. (agriculture) Ploughing.
   2. (of things resembling a furrow):
      1. A long, narrow trench; a ditch.
      2. (in general) A rut or track.

Inflection

Second-declension noun.

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	sulcus	sulcī
Genitive	sulcī	sulcōrum
Dative	sulcō	sulcīs
Accusative	sulcum	sulcōs
Ablative	sulcō	sulcīs
Vocative	sulce	sulcī

Derived terms

• bisulcus

Descendants

• Catalan: solc
• → English: sulcus
• Friulian: solç
• Galician: suco
• Italian: solco
• Neapolitan: surco
• Piedmontese: sorch
• Portuguese: suco
• → Portuguese: sulco
• → Romanian: sulc
• Sardinian: surcu
• Sicilian: surcu
• → Spanish: sulco, surco
• Venetian: solco, solç, solzh

References

• “sulcus”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “sulcus”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• sulcus in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
• sulcus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• De Vaan, Michiel (2008) Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 7)‎^[4], Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN