ampulla

1. A nearly round bottle with two handles used by the ancient Romans for wine, oil, or perfume.
2. Ecclesiastical. A vessel for consecrated wine or holy oil.
3. Anatomy. A small dilatation in a canal or duct, especially one in the semicircular canal of the ear.

[Middle English, from Old English, from Latin, diminutive of amphora. See amphora.]

A dilated portion of a canal or duct, as in the semicircular canal of the ear.

Pertaining to or originating from an ampulla.

• a. anomalies — unilateral aplasia, fusion of, and appendages to the ampullae of the ductus deferens occur in bulls and unilateral aplasia in stallions.

The noun has 2 meanings:

Meaning #1: the dilated portion of a canal or duct especially of the semicircular canals of the ear

Meaning #2: a flask that has two handles; used by Romans for wines or oils

An ampulla (plural "ampullae") was, in Ancient Rome, a "small nearly globular flask or bottle, with two handles" (OED). The word is used of these in archaeology, and of later, often handle-less flasks for holy water or holy oil in the Middle Ages, often bought as souvenirs of pilgrimages.

• Part of the British Crown Jewels is the Ampulla, a hollow, gold, eagle-shaped vessel from which the anointing oil is poured by the Archbishop of Canterbury at the anointing of a new British sovereign at their coronation.

Medicine and science

• By extension, in scientific contexts, it may mean a dilated segment in a tubular structure. It is used to describe several anatomical structures:
  • Ampullae of Lorenzini
  • ampulla of uterine tube
  • ampulla of ductus deferens
  • hepatopancreatic ampulla, also called ampulla of Vater
  • rectal ampulla
  • osseous ampullae

• Ampullae are also bulb-like structures above the tube feet in echinoderms, and in arthropod male genitals.

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