v. [f. late L. trītūrārt-, ppl. stem of trītūrāre to thresh, f. L. trītūra TRITURE. Cf. F. triturer (16th c.).] trans. To reduce to fine particles or powder by rubbing, bruising, pounding, crushing, or grinding; to comminute, pulverize; also, to mix (solids, or a solid and a liquid) in this way. a. Pharm., Geol., etc.
[1623. Cockeram, II. To thresh corne, triturate.]
1755. Johnson, Triturable … (from triturate).
1771. T. Percival, Ess. (1777), I. 60. The mixture was well triturated in a marble mortar.
1796. Kirwan, Elem. Min. (ed. 2), II. 224. Sometimes brittle, sometimes tough according to the proportion of Mercury principally when triturated.
1826. Henry, Elem. Chem., II. 99. Triturate in a mortar, and put the mixture … into a phial.
1862. Dana, Man. Geol., § 51. 49. Rock made from shells … triturated into a calcareous earth by the sea.
b. Phys. said of the action of the molar teeth, the gizzard, etc., upon the food.
1822. [see triturating below].
1835–6. Todd’s Cycl. Anat., I. 311/1. It [the food] is triturated … by the mandibles certainly [in Parrots].
1851. Carpenter, Man. Phys. (ed. 2), 269. By the act of mastication … the food is triturated and mingled with the salivary secretion.
1881. Darwin, Veg. Mould, 18. Worms swallow many little stones, it is probable that they serve, like mill-stones, to triturate their food.
c. fig.
1848. Landor, Imag. Conv., Ser. V. Thiers & Lamartine. At first we were tickled, at last we were triturated.
1881. Scribner’s Mag., Aug., 542. The raw ingredients of our national admixture are supplied quite as rapidly as the whirl and stir of the popular system can triturate and commingle them.
Hence Triturated, Triturating ppl. adjs.
1777. Cook, Voy. Pacific, II. viii. (1784), I. 331. Where the shore is low, the soil is commonly sandy, or rather composed of *triturated coral.
1791. Cowper, Iliad, II. 508. The triturated barley grain First duly sprinkling.
1839. Darwin, Voy. Nat., xix. (1852), 439. Gorges … through which the whole vast amount of triturated matter must have been carried away.
1898. P. Manson, Trop. Diseases, xxxv. 547. Three or four ten- to thirty-grain doses of well triturated thymol in cachets.
1822. J. Parkinson, Outl. Oryctol., 312. In this [fossil elephant’s] tooth … there are only thirteen plates, nine … of which are seen on the *triturating surface.
1835–6. Todd’s Cycl. Anat., I. 318/2. The triturating action of the gizzard.
1860. Maury, Phys. Geog. Sea (Low), § 41. The abrading, triturating power of water.
