arterial

Etymology

It is borrowed from Middle French arterial, now artériel,^[2][3][4][5] and directly borrowed from Medieval Latin arteriālis,^[2][6][7][8] formed from Latin artēria (“artery; windpipe”) and the adjective suffix -ālis.^[2][5] The OED notes that the French adjective is recorded in 1314, in vaine arterial (“pulmonary artery”), and the Medieval Latin one from the 11th century, in vena arterialis, and in a British source of the 13th century in sanguis arterialis (“arterial blood”).^[2] The Latin noun is from Ancient Greek ἀρτηρία (artēría, “windpipe; artery”),^[2][3] the source of artery.^[3][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of or relating to an artery; of blood, contained in the arteries: about 1425, in a translation of Guy de Chauliac's Grande Chirurgie;^[2] Etymonline dates it to the early 15th century.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The word was at first purely anatomical, and Johnson (1755) defined it as relating to or contained in an artery.^[9][2] Since the ancients thought arteries carried air rather than blood, artery itself could also mean the windpipe until the 16th century.^[3] The figurative sense, of a road or line of communication that is a main channel with many branches, appears in 1817 in Coleridge;^[2] Etymonline dates it to 1831.^[3] From 1841 it was used of systems of drains and sewers that branch like arteries,^[2] and in 1920 the adjective became, in the United States, a noun for an arterial road.^[2][5]

Timeline

• c. 1425 – of or relating to an artery; of blood, contained in the arteries.^[2]
• 1817 – of a road or line of transport, serving as a main channel with many branches.^[2] Etymonline dates this sense to 1831.^[3]
• 1841 – of a system of drains or sewers, branching like an artery.^[2]
• 1920 – noun, an arterial road, first in the United States.^[2][5]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of, relating to or affecting an artery or the arteries: arterial disease.^[10][5][2]
2. Of blood, bright red and oxygenated, as carried in the arteries from the lungs; contrasted with venous.^[10][5][7]
3. Of a road or route, being a main thoroughfare with many smaller branches: The new bypass relieves the old arterial road through town.^[10][2]

Noun

1. An arterial road or highway; a through street.^[5][2]

Word family

• arterially
• arterialize
• nonarterial

Related words

• artery

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
5. ^ a b c d e f g Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
9. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
10. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins