groin

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• IPA^(key): /ɡɹɔɪn/
• Rhymes: -ɔɪn
• Homophone: groyne

From earlier grine, from Middle English grinde, grynde, from Old English grynde (“abyss”) (perhaps also "depression, hollow"), probably related to Proto-Germanic *grunduz; see ground. Later altered under the influence of loin.

groin (plural groins)

1. The crease or depression of the human body at the junction of the trunk and the thigh, together with the surrounding region.
   • 2011 October 15, Phil McNulty, “Liverpool 1 - 1 Man Utd”, in BBC Sport‎:

     The Mexican levelled nine minutes from time after Steven Gerrard, making his first start since undergoing groin surgery in April, put Liverpool ahead with a 68th-minute free-kick.

2. The area adjoining this fold or depression.

   He pulled a muscle in his groin.

3. (architecture) The projecting solid angle formed by the meeting of two vaults
4. (euphemistic) The genitals.
   • 1981 December 5, Michael Bronski, “Coming (Out) to Opera”, in Gay Community News, volume 9, number 20, page 5:

     My friend […] discovered in his early teen years a passion for both men and opera. He frequented the Met to satisfy his ear but had little knowledge or experience of where to find partners and satisfy his groin.

   He got kicked in the groin and was writhing in pain.

5. (geometry) The surface formed by two such vaults.
6. (marine engineering) A rigid hydraulic structure built perpendicularly from an ocean shore or a river bank, interrupting water flow and limiting the movement of sediment.

• inguinal

groin (third-person singular simple present groins, present participle groining, simple past and past participle groined)

1. To deliver a blow to the genitals of.

   In the scrum he somehow got groined.

   She groined him and ran to the car.

2. (architecture) To build with groins.
3. (literary, transitive) To hollow out; to excavate.
   • 1918, Wilfred Owen, Strange Meeting:

     Down some profound dull tunnel, long since scooped / Through granites which titanic wars had groined.

From Middle English groynen, from a mixture of Old French groignier, grougnier (from Latin grunniō) and Old English grunnian (from Proto-Germanic *grunnōną).

groin (third-person singular simple present groins, present participle groining, simple past and past participle groined)

1. To grunt; to growl; to snarl; to murmur.
   • c. 1515–1516, published 1568, John Skelton, Againſt venemous tongues enpoyſoned with ſclaunder and falſe detractions &c.:

     Such tunges ſhuld be torne out by the harde rootes,
     Hoyning like hogges that groynis and wrotes.

   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book VI, Canto XII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 27:

     Beares, that groynd continually

groin (plural groins)

1. Alternative spelling of groyne

• Gorin, O-ring, Ringo, giron

Inherited from Old French groing, gruing, from Late Latin grunium.

• IPA^(key): /ɡʁwɛ̃/

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groin m (plural groins)

1. the snout of the pig

• “groin”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

• giron

groin

1. Alternative form of groyn