bursae

Noun

bursa (plural bursae or bursæ)

1. Any of the many small fluid-filled sacs located at the point where a muscle or tendon slides across bone. These sacs serve to reduce friction between the two moving surfaces.
   • A bursa over the anterior aspect of the upper end of the tibia, between the patellar tendon and the tubercle of the tibia, is sometimes enlarged, and may be mistaken for synovitis of the joint.1899, Roswell Park, A Treatise on Surgery, page 402
2. A diverticulum on the cloaca of young birds, which serves as a lymphatic organ and as part of the immune system, but which atrophies as the bird ages.
   • The general relations of the bursa to the cloaca are shown in the two accompanying figures.1898, Frank Evers Beddard, The Structure and Classification of Birds, page 36
3. Any of various pouchlike organs for storing semen prior to copulation in the male or for receiving semen in the female.
   • That portion of the dilated vas deferens which lies outside the cavity of the genital bursa is called the external seminal vesicle .1978, V.M. Ivashkin, Helminths of Farm Animals of the Mongolian People's Republic, page 16
4. A parament about twelve inches square in which the folded corporal is kept in for reasons of reverence.
   • In solemn mass the deacon brings the book of the Missal to the side of the epistle, then goes backward behind the celebrant; the sub-deacon, indeed, goes to the gospel side, where he cleanses the chalice, fits it with the purifacatory, covers it with the paten and pall, folds the corporal, replaces...1853, George Lewis, The Bible, the Missal, and the Breviary, page 358

See all 6 meanings of bursa