Zool. and Anat. [f. L. splēni-um (Pliny), ad. Gr. σπληνίον bandage or compress.]
A. adj. 1. Splenial bone or piece, a splint-like bone or process applied to the inner side of the lower mandible in certain classes of vertebrates below Mammalia.
1848. Owen, Homologies, 15. As it is always applied like a surgeon’s splint or plaster to the inner side of most of the other pieces,… ‘splenial’ … suggested itself to me as the most appropriate name. Ibid. (1849–52), in Todd’s Cycl. Anat., IV. II. 882/2. The alveolar border of the splenial element of the mandible.
1875. Huxley, in Encycl. Brit., I. 755/1. It obviously represents the angular, coronary, and splenial elements, and may be termed the angulo-splenial.
2. Splenial border, the posterior border of the corpus callosum; hence splenial sulcus, etc.
1891. Cent. Dict., s.v., The splenial border of the corpus callosum.
1904. Duckworth, Study Anthrop. Lab., 67. On the mesial aspect of the hemisphere [of the brain] the pars genualis of the splenial sulcus is not visible.
B. sb. The splenial bone or process.
1854. Owen, in Orr’s Circ. Sci., Org. Nat., I. 995. The coronoid is a short compressed plate; the splenial is a longer, slender plate, applied to the inner side of the articular and dentary, and closing the groove on the inner side of the latter.
1888. Rolleston & Jackson, Anim. Life, 402. In Urodela teeth occur … in the lower jaw on the dentary and splenial.
