orifice
Americannoun
noun
Other Word Forms
- orificial adjective
Etymology
Origin of orifice
1535–45; < Middle French < Late Latin ōrificium, equivalent to Latin ōr- (stem of ōs ) mouth + -i- -i- + -fic-, combining form of facere to make, do 1 ( see -fic) + -ium noun suffix
Explanation
An orifice is an opening or a hole, most often in the body. Your mouth is an orifice through which you eat and speak, and your nostrils are orifices through which you breathe. The word orifice is used most often to describe a natural opening in the body. Humans have multiple orifices that provide passageways in and out of the body. The word orifice can also describe an opening into any cavity, such as a hollowed out tree trunk or the vent of a heating system. A volcano has at least one orifice through which lava, ash, and hot gases spew. Caves have orifices through which water, animals, and people can enter and emerge.
Vocabulary lists containing orifice
100 SAT words Beginning with "O"
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Body Language: Or, Os ("Mouth")
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As I Lay Dying
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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.
Second, smaller animals are expected to pee in droplets because their orifice is too tiny to emit anything thicker.
From Science Daily • Mar. 11, 2024
Instead they have a single orifice called a cloaca that is used for defecation as well as reproduction in both males and females.
From Scientific American • Feb. 16, 2023
"One chick was just covered in blood, bleeding from every orifice, and we did everything we could to save it, even giving it an emergency blood transfusion from another owl at the center," Mertz says.
From Salon • Dec. 26, 2021
Although only about 1,600 people died of Ebola over those years, the grotesque nature their deaths — copious hemorrhaging from every orifice — has lent the disease a frightening reputation.
From New York Times • Dec. 22, 2016
Every orifice we can see—Autumn’s mouth, eyes, ears, and nose—is emanating a reddish light.
From "Kwame Crashes the Underworld" by Craig Kofi Farmer
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.
