cypress

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. Any of various evergreen trees or shrubs of the genus Cupressus, native to Eurasia and North America and having opposite, scalelike leaves and globose woody cones.
2. n. Any of several similar or related coniferous trees, such as the bald cypress.
3. n. The wood of any of these trees.
4. n. Cypress branches used as a symbol of mourning.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. In botany: The popular name of coniferous trees of the genus Cupressus. The common cypress of southern Europe is C. sempervirens, of which there are two forms, one with upright appressed branches like a Lombardy poplar, the other a flat-topped tree with horizontal branches. The wood is much used in carpentry. C. macrocarpa, the Monterey cypress of California, is a fine ornamental tree, and is frequently cultivated.
2. n. A name given to other coniferous trees nearly allied to the true cypresses. Such are Lawson's cypress, Chamœcyparis Lawsoniana, and the yellow or Sitka cypress, C. Nutkaensis, of the Pacific coast of North America, both valuable timber-trees and largely cultivated for ornament; the bald, deciduous, black, swampred. or white cypress, of the Atlantic States. Taxodium distichum, a large timber-tree of which the wood varies much in color; the desert-cypress of Australia, Frenela robusta; and the golden cypress, Biota orientalis, of Japan, with yellow foliage.
3. n. One of various plants so named from a fancied resemblance to the true cypress, as the standing cypress, Gilia coronopifolia, a tall, slender, polemoniaceous herb, with divided leaves and scarlet flowers, and the Belvedere, broom-, or summer cypress, a tall chenopodiaceous plant, Kochia scoparia, sometimes cultivated.
4. n. An emblem of mourning for the dead, cypress-branches having been anciently used at funerals.
5. Belonging to or made of cypress.
6. n. A thin transparent black or white stuff; a kind of crape.
7. Made of or resembling cypress.
8. n. The English galingale, Cyperus longus: called sweet cypress from its aromatic roots. Also cypress-root.

Wiktionary

1. n. An evergreen coniferous tree with flattened shoots bearing small scale-like leaves, whose dark foliage is sometimes associated with mourning, in family Cupressaceae, especially the genera Cupressus and Chamaecyparis

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. (Bot) A coniferous tree of the genus Cupressus. The species are mostly evergreen, and have wood remarkable for its durability.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. wood of any of various cypress trees especially of the genus Cupressus
2. n. any of numerous evergreen conifers of the genus Cupressus of north temperate regions having dark scalelike leaves and rounded cones