esophagus
Americannoun
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of esophagus
1350–1400; < New Latin oesophagus < Greek oisophágos gullet, literally, channel for eating ( oiso-, akin to oísein, future infinitive of phérein to carry + -phagos eating); replacing Middle English ysophagus < Medieval Latin
Explanation
The esophagus is the muscular tube that conveys food from the pharynx at the back of the mouth to the stomach. The esophagus is sometimes called the gullet. Humans and other vertebrates have an esophagus. The word comes from the Greek word oisophagos, which means gullet, from the roots oisein, meaning to carry, and phagein, meaning to eat. In British English, the spelling is oesophagus. You should always chew your food thoroughly because you don't want it to get stuck in your esophagus on the way down, unless you're a heron and can swallow fish whole.
Vocabulary lists containing esophagus
Gross, Anatomy!
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Dear Martin
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Human Anatomy and Physiology - Introductory
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Or she operates the machine as the doctor guides a probe down the esophagus.
From The Wall Street Journal • Feb. 7, 2026
Not long after, she went through more procedures: one to amputate her damaged limb and another to cut through her neck to retrieve a fishing hook that had migrated to tissue outside the esophagus.
From Los Angeles Times • Jan. 28, 2026
NRF2 overactivity plays a major role in chemotherapy resistance in several solid tumors, including cancers of the liver, esophagus and head and neck.
From Science Daily • Nov. 17, 2025
The syndrome is caused by a quirk in the muscle that acts as the gatekeeper to the esophagus, the roughly 10-inch-long muscular tube that moves food between the throat and the stomach.
From Salon • Sep. 8, 2024
He can feel the lymph nodes on either side of his neck compressing his esophagus and trachea.
From "All the Light We Cannot See" by Anthony Doerr
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
