# cranium
## English
### Etymology

From Medieval Latin crānium (“skull”), from Ancient Greek κρᾱνίον (krāníon, “skull”).

### Pronunciation

* enPR: krā'nē-əm, IPA: /ˈkɹeɪ.ni.əm/
* Audio (Southern England):(file)
* Audio (US):(file)
* Rhymes: -eɪniəm

### Noun

cranium (plural craniums or crania)
* (anatomy) That part of the skull consisting of the bones enclosing the brain, but not including the bones of the face or jaw.
    Synonyms: braincase, neurocranium
    Hyponyms: calvarium, ethmoid, frontal, occipital, parietal, sphenoid
** 1858, Henry Gray, “The Skull”, in Anatomy: Descriptive and Surgical, page 19:The Skull is divided into two parts, the Cranium and the Face. The Cranium is composed of eight bones; […]
** 1899 February, Joseph Conrad, “The Heart of Darkness”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume CLXV, number M, New York, N.Y.: The Leonard Scott Publishing Company, […], →OCLC, part I, page 201:‘I always ask leave, in the interests of science, to measure the crania of those going out there,’ he said.
** 1908, J. McFadyean, “Part I: Osteology and Arthrology”, in The Comparative Anatomy of the Domesticated Animals, page 165:The cranium of the fowl is composed of the same elements as are present in the mammalian cranium, save that there is no interparietal.
** 2010, Elaine N. Marieb, Katja Hoehn, “Chapter 7 "The Skeleton"”, in Human Anatomy and Physiology, 8th edition, page 200:The cranial bones, or cranium (kra′ne-um), enclose and protect the fragile brain and furnish attachment sites for head and neck muscles.
* (anthropology, informal) The upper portion of the skull, including the neurocranium and facial bones, but not including the jawbone (mandible).
** 2014, Emma L. Brown, Ronald A. Dixon, Jason W. Birkett, “The Discolouration of Human Teeth from Archaeological Contexts: Elemental Analysis of a Black Tooth from a Roman Cranium Recovered from the River Witham, Lincoln, UK”, in Journal of Anthropology, volume 2014, →DOI:In this study, the cranium recovered from the River Witham in Lincoln exhibited a black metallic staining on the surfaces of the teeth.
* (informal) Synonym of skull.

#### Derived terms

* basicranium
* chondrocranium
* cranial
* craniate
* cranio-
* dermatocranium
* desmocranium
* ectocranium
* endocranium
* epicranium
* hemicrania
* intracranium
* neurocranium
* osteocranium
* paracranium
* postcranium
* splanchnocranium
* viscerocranium

#### Translations
### References

* “cranium”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
* “cranium”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.

### Anagrams

* Murcian, cumarin

## Latin
### Etymology

Earliest attestation c. 1190, from Ancient Greek κρᾱνίον (krāníon, “upper part of the head, skull”).

### Pronunciation

* (Classical Latin) IPA: /ˈkraː.ni.um/, [ˈkräːniʊ̃ˑ]
* (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA: /ˈkra.ni.um/, [ˈkräːnium]

### Noun

crānium n (genitive crāniī or crānī); second declension (Medieval Latin)
* (anatomy) skull
    Synonyms: calvāria, calva, testa

#### Inflection

Second-declension noun (neuter).
$^1$Found in older Latin (until the Augustan Age).

#### Derived terms

* crāniālis

#### Descendants

* → Asturian: craniu
* → Catalan: crani
* → Danish: kranium, kranie
* → Dutch: cranium
* → English: cranium
* → Esperanto: kranio
* → French: crâne
* → German: Kranium
* → Galician: cranio
* → Ido: kranio
* → Interlingua: cranio
* → Italian: cranio
* → Kabuverdianu: kraniu
* → Malay: kranium
* → Norman: cranne
* → Norwegian Bokmål: kranium, kranie
* → Norwegian Nynorsk: kranium, kranie
* → Portuguese: crânio
* → Romanian: craniu
* → Spanish: cráneo
* → Swedish: kranium, kranie