Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. The box plant.
- n. The wood of the box plant.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. The fine hard-grained timber of the box, much used by wood-engravers and in the manufacture of musical and mathematical instruments, tool-handles, etc. The largest supplies come from the Levant. The wood is very free from gritty matter, and on that account its sawdust is much used for cleaning jewelry and for other purposes. See
Buxus . - n. The name given to several trees which have hard, compact wood, taking a fine polish: in the United States to Cornus florida, and in the West Indies to Schœfferia frutescens, Vitex umbrosa, and Tecoma pentaphylla. Some species of Eucalyptus and of Tristania are so called in Australia.
Wiktionary
- n. countable, uncountable The box tree, Buxus sempervirens.
- n. uncountable The hard, close-grained wood of this tree, used in delicate woodwork and in making inlays
- n. countable, uncountable Any tree of genus Buxus.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The wood of the box (Buxus).
WordNet 3.0
- n. evergreen shrubs or small trees
- n. very hard tough close-grained light yellow wood of the box (particularly the common box); used in delicate woodwork: musical instruments and inlays and engraving blocks
Etymologies
- box + wood. box from Latin buxus ("box-tree, object made of boxwood"), from Ancient Greek πύξος (puxos, "box tree, boxwood") (Wiktionary)
Examples
“This tiny boxwood is only about 6 inches tall late in the year, it’s often gray and bleak outside — there’s nothing colorful for the eye to fall on.”
Tiny conifers for winter containers and window boxes « Sugar Creek Gardens’ Blog
“The undulating holloway, which has itself sunk through the steady erosion of cartwheels and hooves up to fifteen feet beneath the hillside, translates you from the present into an earlier era when John Nash carved out his woodcuts in English boxwood at the kitchen table under a single lamp-bulb and cultivated the half-wild garden.”
“See Amelanchier for substitutes for boxwood, which is costly.”
“The flowering plants were clipped clean to the ground, and the boxwood was perfectly manicured in patterns that looked as if they had been formed by big biscuit cutters.”
Simon & Schuster: Dark Secrets 2: No Time to Die the Deep End of Fear
“Watched her push back through the boxwood in silence.”
“Faced with the impossibility of obtaining traditional end-grain boxwood blocks to engrave, Mr. Moser found a modern substitute—his striking designs were engraved on polymer resin.”
The Wall Street Journal: Four Centuries of Love and Suffering for the Word
“In the garden out front, hot-pink roses keep company with boxwood hedges and a bronze sculpture of Prometheus Unbound.”
USA Today: Gabrielle Giffords making steady recovery progress
“Some of the original boxwood trees are still on the grounds by the pergola.”
“During the spring and summer, it looks likea low, green shrub — sort of boxwood-looking.”
My favorite winter shrub: Winterberry « Sugar Creek Gardens’ Blog
“In part of the garden designed by Le Nôtre at Château Gourdon, high above the valley, crisp boxwood balls line a path to the edge of the terrace and draw you to the view.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘boxwood’.
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Flora
fenugreek, verbena, saxifrage, arbutus, calendula, nasturtium, lobelia, hellebore, rhododendron, philodendron, bellflower, heuchera and 449 more...
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the road
glaucoma, tarpaulin, flowstone, flue, rimstone, alabaster, gully, shoring, grike, riprap, windfall, transom and 120 more...
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Monovocalics
Words that have only one of the vowels. On this list I include only words with at least three vowels. When I first started the list, if a word had several forms, I generally listed only the one wit...
syzygy, mirific, cumulus, homolog, monocot, bedewed, jezebel, referee, bikini, minikin, locomotor, terebenthene and 2359 more...
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Flora and Fauna
poa annua, pooka, vole, bestiary, popple, turgor, starling, sharpy, copse, coreopsis, clove, corvid and 348 more...
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Fife and Drum Words
For all those fifers and drummers out there... This one's for you.
Related lists are here and here.drum, fife, sticks, ears, rope-tensioned, snare, snare head, batter head, shell, rim, sling, paradiddle and 72 more...
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Violins
scroll, neck, bridge, fingerboard, tailpiece, shoulder rest, chin rest, pegs, strings, body, f-holes, sound post and 29 more...
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Woodworking Materials
Woodworking glossary (part 2) - Types of wood and other materials used in the workshop to build, repair or in the finishing processes.
softwood, hardwood, pine, walnut, cherry, mdf, shellac, tung oil, steel wool, polyurethane, mahogany, linseed oil and 25 more...
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vegetation
names of plants, flowers, trees, etc.
laburnum, mignonette, ilex, vetch, sedge, gentian, plane, linden, jade plant, ginkgo, dragon tree, agave and 50 more...
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The Sirens of Titan
Words gathered while reading The Sirens of Titan by Kurt Vonnegut.
edwardian, rakehell, chrono-synclastic..., parvenu, chiton, dottle, ort, residua, narwhal, lulu, peyotl, peignoir and 49 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for boxwood.
rolig Buxus sempervirens
May 11, 2008