[a. F. cartilage (16th c. in Littré), ad. L. cartilāgo gristle.]
1. A firm elastic flexible tissue, of a whitish translucent color, in vertebrate animals; gristle.
Temporary cartilage is that which occurs only in very early life, and subsequently ossifies or changes to bone; permanent cartilage is that which permanently retains its character, e.g., the articular cartilage which coats the ends of bones at the joints, and the membraniform cartilage which occurs in the walls of cavities.
1541. R. Copland, Guydon’s Quest. Chirurg. What is cartylage?… It is a substaunce as it were of the kynde of bones, but it is softer or sowpler than the bone is.
1633. P. Fletcher, Purple Isl., IV. 44, note. The winde-pipe … is framed partly of cartilage, or grisly matter, because the voice is perfected with hard & smooth things.
1797. Godwin, Enquirer, I. iii. 15. What at first was cartilage … gradually becomes bone.
1873. Mivart, Elem. Anat., ii. 24. The adjacent surfaces of bones are coated with smooth cartilage.
b. A structure or formation consisting of cartilage, a gristly part; as the cartilages of the ribs.
1541. R. Copland, Guydon’s Quest. Chirurg. The bones, grystles, or cartilages, the synewes.
1827. J. F. Cooper, Prairie, II. i. 5. Ornaments … pendant from the cartilages of his ears.
† 2. Applied to the coats of an onion. Obs.
1563. Hyll, Art Garden. (1593), 131. The … number of cartilages, with the which the bodie [of an onion] is included.
3. Comb., as cartilage-corpuscle, -like adj.
1847. Todd, Cycl. Anat., IV. 518/1. The cartilage-like tendon.
1876. trans. Wagner’s Gen. Pathol., 154. Bone and cartilage-corpuscles never contained cinnabar.
