parietal

1 of 2

adjective

pa·​ri·​e·​tal pə-ˈrī-ə-tᵊl 

1

a

: of or relating to the walls of a part or cavity

b

: of, relating to, or located near or within the parietal bone or parietal lobe of the head

2

: attached to the main wall rather than the axis or a cross wall of a plant ovary

—used of an ovule or a placenta

3

dated : of or relating to college living or its regulation

especially : of or relating to parietals (see parietal entry 2 sense 2)

All of this takes place in a residential environment no longer constrained by the parietal hours that the older set of today's parents will recall. One of the signature changes in the student revolt of the late sixties/early seventies was the end not only of curfew hours for residence halls but also of housing separated by sex.

—Barrett Seaman

parietal

2 of 2

noun

1

: a parietal part (such as a bone, scale, or plate)

2

parietals plural, dated : the regulations governing the visiting privileges of members of the opposite sex in campus dormitories

Did you know?

Fifteenth-century scientists first used "parietal" (from Latin paries, meaning "wall of a cavity or hollow organ") to describe a pair of bones of the roof of the skull between the frontal and posterior bone. Later, "parietal" was also applied to structures connected to or found in the same general area as these bones; the parietal lobe, for example, is the middle division of each hemisphere of the brain. In the 19th century, botanists adopted "parietal" as a word for ovules and placentas attached to the walls of plant ovaries. It was also in the 19th century that "parietal" began to be heard on college campuses, outside of the classroom; in 1837, Harvard College established the Parietal Committee to be in charge of "all offences against good order and decorum within the walls."

Examples of parietal in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Adjective

The study published by the Lancet, found that 94% of patients diagnosed with Posterior Cortical Atrophy, or PCA, a neurodegenerative condition that impairs one's vision and mainly affects the occipital and parietal cortex, also had Alzheimer's. —Julia Gomez, USA TODAY, 26 Jan. 2024

Electrodes were placed on the top and center of the volunteer’s head, near the medial parietal cortex—the part of the brain that completes visual scene processing. —IEEE Spectrum, 16 Dec. 2023

The researchers didn’t study the prefrontal or parietal cortices, where the majority of number neurons are located in monkeys. —Yasemin Saplakoglu, Quanta Magazine, 9 Nov. 2023

The parietal cortex, on the other hand, is responsible for controlling the body. —Joshua Rapp Learn, Discover Magazine, 19 Sep. 2023

Areas of the brain involved in processing visual motion (the right middle temporal cortical areas) and in understanding the thoughts and intentions of others (the right temporal parietal junction) were involved in processing the face’s gaze when staring at the tree. —Robert Martone, Scientific American, 29 Dec. 2020

Four months in the hospital During that time, Gomez said Catherine had surgery to remove parts of her frontal, parietal, and temporal lobes on the left side of the brain. —Mary Kekatos, ABC News, 1 Aug. 2023

Only in some of these brain areas did neural activation peak prior to the spontaneous arising of a thought – most notably in the medial temporal lobe and inferior parietal lobule... —Neuroskeptic, Discover Magazine, 28 Apr. 2016

The parietal pleura is a membrane that folds back on itself to form a two-layered sac. —Howard Cohen Miami Herald (tns), al, 26 July 2022

Noun

When the subjects lying in the scanner decided to bluff against a human component—but not against the computer—an area called the temporal-parietal junction (TPJ) suddenly blazed with activity. —Elizabeth Preston, Discover Magazine, 12 July 2012

Not all of the study's archeologists would agree that the findings fully qualify as parietal, which is often used to describe paintings on cave walls and meaning something cannot move from place to place. —Scott Gleeson, USA TODAY, 21 Sep. 2021

That privilege belongs to more posterior regions—the parietal, temporal and occipital lobes. —Christof Koch, Scientific American, 10 May 2021

Synchronous brain activity was localized in the left hemisphere of the brain, to an area known as the temporal-parietal junction. —Robert Martone, Scientific American, 2 June 2020

At 80 milliseconds, that activity suppression spread throughout the posterior parietal cortex. —Richard Sima, Scientific American, 23 Dec. 2019

Glimcher and collaborators have shown that neurons in part of the brain called the parietal cortex do indeed behave this way, adding physiological support for the model. —Quanta Magazine, 23 Aug. 2016

This video shows a monitor lizard skull fossil fragment with both the parietal and pineal foramina visible (highlighted in yellow). —Amina Khan, latimes.com, 3 Apr. 2018

These have two conventional eyes and two parietals, one derived from the parapineal and the other from the pineal. —The Economist, 5 Apr. 2018

Word History

Etymology

Adjective

Middle English, from Medieval Latin parietalis, from pariet-, paries wall of a cavity or hollow organ, from Latin, wall

First Known Use

Adjective

15th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1a

Noun

15th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Phrases Containing parietal

• parietal bone
• parietal cell
• parietal lobe

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Kids Definition

parietal

adjective

pa·​ri·​etal

pə-ˈrī-ət-ᵊl

: of, relating to, or forming the upper back wall of the head

Medical Definition

parietal

1 of 2 adjective

pa·​ri·​etal pə-ˈrī-ət-ᵊl 

1

: of or relating to the walls of a part or cavity compare visceral

2

: of, relating to, or located in the upper posterior part of the head

specifically : relating to the parietal bones

parietal

2 of 2 noun

: a parietal part (as a bone)