cranial
Americanadjective
adjective
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of cranial
Explanation
Something that's cranial has to do with your skull. A severe cranial injury requires testing to make sure you don't have a concussion. Your cranium is your skull — the hard bone that encloses and protects your brain. Things that are cranial are connected to this part of your body — the cranial space is the area inside your skull, and cranial nerves are connected to your brain. The Greek root of both cranium and cranial is kranion, "skull" or "upper part of the head."
Vocabulary lists containing cranial
Noggin
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Forget Me Not
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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.
And because the jaw and the nervous system are so closely linked through the major cranial nerves, our muscles are triggered and we clench and grind our teeth.
From BBC ● Sep. 12, 2026
Medtronic is a key player in the $15 billion External link cranial and spinal technologies market.
From Barron's ● Jun. 17, 2026
The book’s appendix provides six pages of instructions for performing a cranial exam but concludes by reminding would-be practitioners not to fret over their lack of experience because “phrenology isn’t real anyhow.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 29, 2026
The reason: Wearing the devices just occasionally tricks your brain into thinking you don’t need them, and that’ll confuse the prized three-pound master cranial organ a top your spinal cord.
From Salon ● Sep. 30, 2024
“To imply the Cro-Magnon were lug heads is wrong. They exhibited a cranial capacity approximately sixteen hundred cubic centimeters larger than modern-day humans.’
From "Burning Blue" by Paul Griffin
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Get a wordDefinitions 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.
