Dictionary

overjaw en · NOUN

Etymology

From Middle English overjowe, over jawe, a partial calque of earlier Middle English over chavel (“upper jaw”), equivalent to over- + jaw.

Meanings

1. (rare) The upper jaw (superior maxillary).
   • He drove her over the Hayward Fault, its boundaries jammed together like an overjaw clenched to an underjaw. 2022, Sharon Olds, Balladz, page 143:
   • And when they eat, they move the overjaw and nought the nether jaw, and they have no tongue. 1926, Arthur Percival Newton, Travel and Travellers of the Middle Ages, page 161:
   • The King was now represented with a receding forehead, a lined and haggard face, a long nose, thick lips, slanting eyes, a hanging overjaw, and hollow cheeks. 1993, The S S E A Journal, volume 23, page 66:

Forms

Antonyms

underjaw · lower jaw · netherjaw