Log in or Sign up
  1. dogwood love

Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. n. A tree (Cornus florida) of eastern North America, having small greenish flowers surrounded by four large, showy white or pink bracts that resemble petals.
  2. n. Any of several trees or shrubs of the genus Cornus.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. n. A tree of the genus Cornus; the cornel; especially, in Europe, the wild or male cornel, C. sanguinea. Also called dogwood-tree. In the United States some of the species are familiar, as the flowering dogwood, C. florida, a highly ornamental tree, of moderate size, covered in May or early June with a profusion of large white or pale-pink flowers; the Californian dogwood, C. Nuttallii; the swamp-dogwood, C. sericea; and the dwarf dogwood, C. Canadensis. See Cornus.
  2. n. The wood of trees of the genus Cornus. Dogwood is so exceptionally free from silex that watchmakers use small splinters of it for cleaning out the pivot-holes of watches, and opticians for removing dust from small deep-seated lenses.
  3. n. Any cornel-like shrub so called, as in England the Euonymus Europœus. The black dogwood of Europe is Rhamnus Frangula and Prunus Padus, and of the West Indies, Piscidia Carthaginensis; false or striped dogwood, Acer Pennsylvanicum; Jamaica or white dogwood, Piscidia Erythrina; poison dogwood, Rhus venenata; pond-dogwood, Cephalanthus occidentalis; and the white dogwood of England, Viburnum Opulus. The Tasmanian dogwood, Bedfordia salicina, of the natural order Compositœ, has a beautifully marked wood, used in cabinet-work. The dogwood of Australia, Jacksonia scoparia, a leguminous shrub, has a disagreeable odor when burning.
  4. n. Pomaderris apetala, a small rhamnaceous tree of Tasmania, yielding a beautiful satiny wood suitable for carving and turning. See Pomaderris.
  5. n. The poison sumac, Rhus Vernix.
  6. n. The hop-tree, Ptelea trifoliata.
  7. n. Same as Jamaica *dogwood.

Wiktionary

  1. n. Any of various small trees of the genus Cornus, especially the wild cornel and the flowering cornel
  2. n. The wood of such trees and shrubs.
  3. n. A wood or tree similar to this genus, used in different parts of the world.

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. n. (Bot.) The Cornus, a genus of large shrubs or small trees, the wood of which is exceedingly hard, and serviceable for many purposes.

WordNet 3.0

  1. n. a tree of shrub of the genus Cornus often having showy bracts resembling flowers
  2. n. hard tough wood of any dogwood of the genus Cornus; resembles boxwood

Etymologies

  1. From dag, a sharp object, + wood. (Wiktionary)

Examples

  • “In fact, the dogwood is a poignant reminder of the hundred-year gap between the first and second incarnations of this garden.”

    A Brand-New Olmsted

  • “The man sitting alone in the shade of a small dogwood is equally unaware.”

    CLOUD DANCING • by J. Thomas Arant

  • “Our dogwood is filled with white blossoms though, and I know the geese will be laying eggs.”

    Sprung!

  • “Actually, I thought it was a dogwood from the flowers, but only recalled seeing them before some 30 yrs ago, while growing up here in the Pacific Northwest.”

    Dogwood Fruit

  • “There are stately pine forests extending along the centre of the island; but the most beautiful of its trees are what are commonly called dogwood, the laurel, and a delicate species of the white oak.”

    North Carolina and its Resources.

  • “The berry of the round-leaved dogwood is of a very delicate blue.”

    Rural Hours

  • “Carolyn Gail, thanks, I also thought the dogwood was our tree, but was corrected and now know it is the tulip poplar.”

    Pink Dogwood Winter « Fairegarden

  • “The dogwood is a seedling from our first Tennessee house, one of several herethat are now flowering size.”

    Enigmatic Prose « Fairegarden

  • “When "the leaf of the dogwood is the size of a squirrel's ear," it is planting time.”

    Stories the Iroquois Tell Their Children

  • “The mosses and the lichens have proceeded far enough in their work of disintegration to provide substance for the slender red stem of dogwood, which is growing out of the soil they have made.”

    Some Winter Days in Iowa

Show 10 more examples...

Lists

These user-created lists contain the word ‘dogwood’.

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • slumry Arf, arf, Stephen says every time he passes one. (sorry) Jul 11, 2007

Tweets

Looking for tweets for dogwood.

‘dogwood’ has been looked up 2572 times, loved by 1 person, added to 22 lists, commented on 1 time, and has a Scrabble score of 13.