papilla
noun
Simple meaning
Any of the small protuberances on the upper surface of the tongue often containing taste buds.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
puhpiluhSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
pəˈpɪlə
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
Any of the small protuberances on the upper surface of the tongue often containing taste buds.
Any of the vascular protuberances of the dermal layer of the skin extending into the epidermal layer and often containing tactile corpuscles.
A small projection of tissue at the base of a hair or tooth or feather
A vascular process of connective tissue extending into and nourishing the root of a hair, feather, or developing tooth.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C2 · Proficient (estimated)
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: Any of the small protuberances on the upper surface of the tongue often containing taste buds.
Used this way, papilla is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It stays understated rather than dramatic. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Mild
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Matter-of-fact
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Common Patterns and Combinations
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.