osculate

English

Etymology 1

Borrowed from Latin ōsculātus, perfect active participle of ōsculor (“to kiss”) (see -ate (verb-forming suffix)), from ōsculum (“a kiss”) + -or (verbal suffix), from ōs (“mouth”) + -culum (diminutive suffix).^[1] Doublet of oscillate.

Pronunciation

(Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈɒskjʊˌleɪt/, /ˈɒskjəˌleɪt/
Audio (Southern England): (file)
(General American) IPA^(key): /ˈɑskjəˌleɪt/, /ˈɑskjuˌleɪt/
Audio: (file)

Verb

osculate (third-person singular simple present osculates, present participle osculating, simple past and past participle osculated)

(ambitransitive) To kiss.
- 2001, Jonathan Franzen, The Corrections:
  And in the Olmsted Hotel in Cleveland he surprised a porter and a maid lasciviously osculating in a stairwell.
(mathematics) To touch so as to have the same tangent and curvature at the point of contact.
(intransitive) To make contact.
(Vedic arithmetic) To perform osculation.
To form a connecting link between two genera.

Derived terms

Related terms

osculation

Etymology 2

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