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/pˈɛktərəl/ Listen

noun

Pectoral n.

1.

A covering or protecting for the breast.

2.

(Eccl.)

(a)

A breastplate, esp. that worn by the Jewish high person.

(b)

A clasp or a cross worn on the breast.

3.

A medicine for diseases of the chest organs, especially the lungs.

adjective

Pectoral adj.

1.

Of or pertaining to the breast, or chest; as, the pectoral muscles.

2.

Relating to, or good for, diseases of the chest or lungs; as, a pectoral remedy.

3.

(Zool.) Having the breast conspicuously colored; as, the pectoral sandpiper.

Pectoral arch, or Pectoral girdle (Anat.), the two or more bony or cartilaginous pieces of the vertebrate skeleton to which the fore limbs are articulated; the shoulder girdle. In man it consists of two bones, the scapula and clavicle, on each side.

Pectoral cross (Eccl.), a cross worn on the breast by bishops and abbots, and sometimes also by canons.

Pectoral fins, or Pectorals (Zool.), fins situated on the sides, behind the gills.

Pectoral rail. (Zool.) See Land rail (b) under Land.

Pectoral sandpiper (Zool.), the jacksnipe (b).

See images of 'Pectoral'

Etymology of 'Pectoral'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Pectoral" Quotes from Famous Books

... was saved from the insipidity of too great perfection by the imperious—rather ruthless—lines of his mouth and the penetrating lustre of his deep-set eyes. His dress—a black cassock edged and buttoned with crimson, with a crimson skullcap and biretta, and a pectoral cross of gold—enhanced the picturesqueness of his aspect, and as he entered the anteroom where one awaited his approach, the most Protestant ...

— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell

... posterior end of molariform tooth-rows, larger external auditory meatus, and narrower palatine breadth. Neotoma angustapalata differs from the description of N. distincta in having a faintly bicolored tail, no ochraceous pectoral band, broadly concave sides to interpterygoid fossa, and narrower ...

— Mammals from Tamaulipas, Mexico • Rollin H. Baker

... Civilization keeps alive, in every generation, multitudes who would otherwise die prematurely. These millions of invalids do not owe to civilization their diseases, but their lives. It is painful that your sick friend should live on Cherry Pectoral; but if he had been born in barbarism, he would neither have had it to drink nor ...

— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 39, January, 1861 • Various

... the steps of the great door of the cathedral that looks upon the marketplace where the tram-lines meet, and he had been dressed very magnificently and rather after the older use. He had been wearing a tunicle and dalmatic under a chasuble, a pectoral cross, purple gloves, sandals and buskins, a mitre and his presentation ring. In his hand he had borne his pastoral staff. And the clustering pillars and arches of the great doorway were painted with a loving flat particularity that omitted nothing but the ...

— Soul of a Bishop • H. G. Wells

... his lady saw them off; therefore, there was a crowd. The mother never before had noted what a frail and dangerous thing a canoe is. She cautioned her son never to venture out alone, and to be sure that he rubbed his chest with the pectoral balm she had made from such and such a famous receipt, the one that saved the life but not the limb of old Governor Stuyvesant, and come right home if you catch a cold; and wait at the first camp ...

— Rolf In The Woods • Ernest Thompson Seton

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