Word.ws English Dictionary

acnestis

Syllables: acnes·tis/ækˈniːstɪs/

acnestis noun: the section of an animal's skin that it cannot reach in order to scratch itself, usually the space between the shoulder blades.

Noun

acnestis

  1. The section of an animal's skin that it cannot reach in order to scratch itself, usually the space between the shoulder blades.
    • Acneſtis, from α priv. and κναειν to ſcratch. That part of the ſpine of the back, which reaches from the metaphrenon, which is the part betwixt the ſhoulder blades, to the loins. This part ſeems to have been originally called ſo in quadrupeds only, becauſe they cannot reach it to ſcratch.1794, John Quincy, Lexicon Physico-medicum: Or, a New Medicinal Dictionary. Explaining the Difficult Terms Used in the Several Branches of the Profession. And in such Parts of Natural Philosophy, as...
    • ACNÉSTIS (ακνηςις, from α neg. and κναω to ſcratch). That part of the ſpine between the ſhoulder-blades, and which extends to the loins. It is ſo called from the difficulty there is to reach and ſcratch it.1802, W[illiam] Turton, A Medical Glossary: In which the Words in the Various Branches of Medicine are Deduced from their Original Languages; Properly Accented and Explained, 2nd edition, London...

Examples of acnestis in a sentence

  • That spot known to crossword solvers as the acnestis.1927 April 3, The Observer, London:
  • This pattern of sparing has been called the reverse butterfly sign; the Greek word for the area that cannot be reached is acnestis.2000, Otto Braun-Falco with Gerd Plewig, Helmut H. Woolf, and Walter H. C. Burgdorf, Dermatology, 2nd completely rev. edition, Berlin...
  • I scratched the spot between his shoulders, the acnestis that animals can't scratch by themselves, and he looked up at me and smiled.2010, Blaize Clement, Raining Cat Sitters and Dogs: A Dixie Hemingway Mystery, New York, N.Y.: Thomas Dunne Books, →ISBN, page 24:
  • Acnestis (n.) On an animal, the point of the back that lies between the shoulders and the lower back, which cannot be reached to be scratched.2010, Ammon Shea, Satisdiction: One Man's Journey into all the Words He'll Ever Need, London: Penguin Books, →ISBN:

Origin of acnestis

From Late Latin acnestis, from Koine Greek ἄκνηστις (áknēstis, “spine”), from κνῆστις (knêstis, “spine, cheese-grater”), or from ἀ- (a-) + -κναίειν (-knaíein, “grate, scrape, scratch”) (only attested in compounds), or from incorrect segmentation of κατὰ κνῆστιν (katà knêstin, “on the spine”) (see Homer, Odyssey 10.161), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *kneh₂-.

Questions about acnestis

What does acnestis mean?
Acnestis means the section of an animal's skin that it cannot reach in order to scratch itself, usually the space between the shoulder blades.
How do you use acnestis in a sentence?
That spot known to crossword solvers as the acnestis.
What part of speech is acnestis?
Acnestis is a noun.
How do you pronounce acnestis?
Acnestis is pronounced /ækˈniːstɪs/ (UK).

Words near acnestis in the dictionary

  1. acneform
  2. acnegenic
  3. acneic
  4. acneiform
  5. acnes
  6. acnestis
  7. acnidosporidian
  8. acnidosporidians
  9. acnistin
  10. acnistins
  11. acnodal

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: acnestis (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-acnestis.wav.

Cite this entry: “acnestis.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/acnestis. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.