palate
Meaning of palate: The partition that allows breathing and chewing to happen at once, half rigid bone and half moving muscle.
Definition of palate
The palate is the roof of the mouth, the partition separating the mouth from the nasal cavity above it. Its front portion is built on bone and covered by firm ridged tissue, forming the hard palate. Behind that lies the soft palate, a muscular flap ending in the uvula, which lifts to close off the nose during swallowing and speech.
Why is it split into a hard and a soft part?
Because it has two incompatible jobs. Chewing needs a firm surface for the tongue to press food against, and the hard palate supplies one, its ridges helping to grip and break up what is being eaten. Sealing off the nose needs something that moves, and the soft palate does that, swinging upward against the back wall of the throat during a swallow so that nothing travels up into the nose. The same flap opens and closes constantly during speech, which is why one structure cannot serve both purposes.
What happens when it fails?
The results are recognizable. If the soft palate does not seal properly, air escapes through the nose while talking, giving the voice a nasal quality and blurring the consonants that need pressure to form, and drinks may come back down the nose during a swallow. If it is long and floppy it vibrates during sleep, which is where much snoring originates. Nerve damage after a stroke can leave one side hanging lower than the other, something visible when the person holds a long vowel and the palate lifts unevenly.
How do the two parts compare?
| Feature | Hard palate | Soft palate |
|---|---|---|
| Built from | Bone under tightly bound tissue | Muscle under loose tissue |
| Moves | No | Yes |
| Main role | A firm surface for chewing | Sealing the nose off during swallowing and speech |
| Feel to the tongue | Firm and ridged | Soft and yielding |
Cleft palate arises when the two halves of the roof fail to fuse during early development, leaving an opening between mouth and nose that interferes with feeding and later with speech, and it occurs with or without a cleft lip. The palate is also a site where growths appear, including tumors of the small salivary glands scattered through it, so a firm swelling there is treated as a finding requiring explanation.
Also known as
Used in a sentence
The soft palate elevated symmetrically on examination.
Good to know
The soft palate seals off the nose during swallowing and speech, so weakness of it produces nasal-sounding speech and fluid escaping through the nose rather than any difficulty within the mouth.
Word origin
Where “palate” comes from
Palate comes from the Latin palatum, the roof of the mouth.