ossified
part of speech
adjective (ossified); also the past form of the verb ossify (ossify, ossifies, ossified, ossifying)
meaning for a pupil
1) (science) Ossified means turned into bone: soft cartilage that has hardened into bone, as happens in a growing child's skeleton. tree →
2) (formal) Ossified describes ideas, rules or groups that have become fixed, stiff and unable to change, like old dry bones. tree →
sense in the lessons
In science lessons about the human body, a baby's skeleton is partly soft cartilage that slowly becomes ossified as the child grows. In history and argument it describes old-fashioned systems that never change: «an ossified government». Phrases: became ossified, ossified ideas, ossified rules.
examples
- A baby's skull is not fully ossified, so it has soft spots. tree →
- As children grow, cartilage in the bones becomes ossified. tree →
- The old club had ossified rules that nobody dared to change. tree →
- The teacher said the empire's government had become ossified and slow. tree →
- The X-ray showed which bones had ossified. tree →
- Some ideas grow ossified if nobody questions them. tree →
note
From Latin «os» = bone. Verb ossify: ossifies, ossified (y changes to i). Noun: ossification. The second sense is figurative and formal. Do not confuse with «fossilised», which means preserved in rock; but both can be used for ideas that are stuck in the past.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «ossified» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.