English
hyoplastron
Coined by Thomas Henry Huxley in 1872 as hyo- + plastron.
Proto-Indo-European *weyd- ‘to see’
…
Ancient Greek ῡ̔οειδής ‘shaped like the letter υ (upsilon)’
Latin hȳoīdēs ‘U-shaped’
French hyoïde ‘hyoid’
English hyoid
English hyo-
Ancient Greek πλᾰ́σσω ‘to plaster’
…
Italian impiastrare ‘to plaster’
Italian piastra ‘breastplate’
Italian piastrone
French plastron
English plastron
The story
Coined by Thomas Henry Huxley in 1872 as hyo- + plastron. Superseded the earlier hyosternum, a nominalised form of the French adjective hyosternal, coined by Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire in 1818. The prefix is from Ancient Greek ῡ̔οειδής (hūoeidḗs, “shaped like the letter Υ”), ultimately from ὗ (hû, “the Greek letter upsilon”), reflecting its original description as the sternal attachment of the sternohyoid muscle (whose other attachment is on the hyoid bone).
Today it means
noun The second lateral plate in the plastron of turtles.
Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.
Etymograph / hyoplastron