Talk:maxillary

RFV discussion: September–October 2020

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maxillary

Rfv-sense. According to the noun entry, maxillary = jawbone. I thought mandible = jawbone. According to the sense #2 of jawbone, maxillary is one of the jawbones, but currently, I believe, the rfv'ed entry is somewhat misleading. The adjective section does not look perfect either. --Hekaheka (talk) 15:07, 21 September 2020 (UTC)

The adjective is from Latin maxillaris, which means, “related to the maxilla”, where the latter means “jawbone” both in post-classical Latin and in modern medical Latin, in which it is a synonym of os maxillare or “maxillary bone”. I think the noun sense derives from a shortening of the latter term. When properly used, there is a distinction: the maxillary is the upper jawbone, and the mandible the lower one, as illustrated in this image. I think this distinction was already present in pre-medical Latin; maxilla is derived from mala for which L&S write, “the cheek-bone, jaw; in the stricter anatomical sense, the upper bones of the face, between the eyes, nose, and mouth, in which the teeth are fixed”, while the term mandibula is related to chewing.  --Lambiam 16:17, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

No, they are synonyms. mandibula, often plural mandibulae, is a Late Latin replacement term for māxilla, also often plural māxillae and then sometimes meaning “chin”. The Thesaurus Linguae Latinae, the authors of which surely know how to write correct Latin, dedicated only twenty-five lines to mandibulae and explain them as “i.q. ossa maxillaria, quibus dentes infixi sunt, malae, maxillae”. One quote is Vulgate Judges 15, 15, where one reads “maxillam id est mandibulam asini” – “the jawbone that is the jawbone of the ass”. Nonetheless only māxilla survived into Romance. māxilla is of course defined in the ThLL as “i.q. mandibulae, ossa, quibus dentes infixi sunt”.

So I don’t know what would be misleading. There are a lot of translations to merge; to upper jaw and lower jaw, since obviously English users are baffled by the Latin. Fay Freak (talk) 16:50, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

While there may be some confusion about the Latin, the English term is pretty unambiguously the upper jawbone (or a tooth emerging from the upper jawbone). This is cited. Kiwima (talk) 22:57, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 21:02, 7 October 2020 (UTC)