Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Any of various trees of the genus Carpinus, having smooth grayish bark and hard whitish wood.
- n. The wood of one of these trees.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A small tree belonging to the genus Carpinus, of the natural order Cupuliferæ. The American hornbeam, also called blue beech, water-beech and ironwood, is C. Caroliniana or Americana. It is a shrub or small tree, 10 to 20 feet high, with very heavy, hard, close-grained wood, which is sometimes used in making carpenter’ tools, handles, etc. The European hornbeam, C. Betulus, is also a small tree much planted in England. The wood makes a fine elastic tip for a fishing-rod, and is also used for agricultural implements, mallets, cogs of wheels, etc. Also called yoke-elm, hardbeam, and horn-beech. See cut under
Carpinus .
Wiktionary
- n. A tree of the genus Carpinus, having a smooth gray bark and a ridged trunk, the wood being white and very hard, common along the banks of streams in the United States.
- n. A hop hornbeam.
- n. The wood of these trees.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. (Bot.) A tree of the genus Carpinus (Carpinus Americana), having a smooth gray bark and a ridged trunk, the wood being white and very hard. It is common along the banks of streams in the United States, and is also called
ironwood . The English hornbeam is Carpinus Betulus. The American is called alsoblue beech andwater beech .
WordNet 3.0
- n. any of several trees or shrubs of the genus Carpinus
Etymologies
- c. 1570, from Old English horn + beam ("tree") (Wiktionary)
Examples
“The repetition of boxwood, yew and hornbeam—stalwarts of the French garden—creates an overall harmony, a symphony in green.”
“As my patient husband remarked recently, "I understand now: box, yew, hornbeam and more box, yew and hornbeam.”
“Charlotte Moss This window in a hornbeam hedge at d'Orsan provides a view of the enfilade of outdoor rooms.”
“The first frost had come and the colour was already in the hornbeam as I gathered up a clump of bulbs to bring with me to my new home in Somerset and, weather permitting, I expect to have them in flower until the end of the month.”
“We were looking for hardhack, the local name for hop hornbeam, a heavy, dense hardwood that wears extremely well and is, according to Mr. Owens, the very best material from which to make a jumper.”
“Starlings flitter in the branches of the dead hornbeam by the fence.”
hayden carruth | silence & prepare « poetry dispatch & other notes from the underground
“Then Cicero and I rose early one morning, while the rest of the household was asleep, and took it into the nearby woods and buried it between a hornbeam and an ash.”
“The foundation of the arches was fashioned in 1993, and it took several years for the hornbeam to cover them.”
“Photograph by Alexandre Bailhache Pleached hornbeam arches and chestnut pergolas create verdant alleys connecting one garden room to the next and provide shaded, secluded walks.”
“Photograph by Alexandre Bailhache Shown here in autumn, the Prieur é is surrounded by arched hornbeam hedges.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘hornbeam’.
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See cut under
A list of words with definitions directing us to "see cut under" (or "see cut at") another definition (with hilarity occasionally ensuing).
Compare compare-cut-under.spider, scorpion, spoonbill, spur, tooth, feather, gnat, beard, gyrate, astragal, jog, countercheck and 92 more...
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Beams
laser beam, laserbeam, beam, beams, Beam, Gaussian beam, Jim Beam, balance beam, beaming, beamed, sunbeam, moonbeam and 41 more...
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smoooth
satined, sleek, glossy, legato, uncrannied, suave, smoothen, polish, satiny, flowing, levigate, politic and 78 more...
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♥
ambrosia, inamorata, gossamer, lily-white, hummingbird, roucoulement, poppy, daisy, calypso, lunula, lamb, dove and 1526 more...
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harry potter words
quidditch, apparate, disapparate, lumos, snitch, pensieve, dementor, azkaban, wingardium, leviosa, horcrux, bludger and 376 more...
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And another
retrocausality, brusque, gainsay, cheerio, jaundiced, chamois, caw, craw, fudge, bubbler, shebang, bolo and 244 more...
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Outlander series words
A place for me to keep words I found (or found anew) while reading Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series. (Culling my enormous "Learned (or Encountered) in Reading" list.)
gralloch, yeuk, corpse-candle, saprophytic, baldachin, Kermanshah, celandine, tynchal, quaich, mesentery, basidium, dittany and 244 more...
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Trees!
mahogany, sequoia, balsa, sandalwood, tamarind, balsam, eucalyptus, birch, willow, buttonwood, evergreen, loblolly and 501 more...
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bark
liminal space forms
cinnamon, sycamore, ponderosa, Leucadendron arge..., cork, cinchona, angostura, barque, sassafras, arf, yip, quebracho and 94 more...
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Arboreal delight
oak, yew, eucalyptus, bottlebrush, mahogany, pine, holly, birch, willow, fir, wattle, dogwood and 16 more...
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The Romance of the Rose
Words and phrases from the thirteenth century poem Roman de la Rose by Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun.
The Romance of th..., Roman de la Rose, Guillaume de Lorris, Jean de Meun, Macrobius, Scipio, verdure, rose, heart-sweet, hard heart, needlecase, zigzag lacing and 65 more...
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Mill
The milling of grain: tools, people, processes, laws.
mill, grain, flour, miller, water-wheel, meal, thirl, thirlage, sucken, suckener, astricted, outsucken and 33 more...
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Aw, Nuts
What it says. Including the ones that aren't really nuts, like peanuts and almonds.
walnut, chestnut, pecan, cashew, peanut, brazil nut, pistachio, hazelnut, almond, coconut, macademia, filbert and 22 more...
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the grove
hawthorn, poplar, cedar, myrtle, rowan, oak, hornbeam, alder, yew, hazel, cypress, elder and 64 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for hornbeam.
chained_bear "Panting, sweating, covered with crumbled leaves and with my stockings in rags, I curled up under a big hornbeam, and burrowed back under the blanket. Thus concealed, I had a try at undoing the knots in the rope around my wrists...."
—Diana Gabaldon, A Breath of Snow and Ashes (New York: Bantam Dell, 2005), 215 Jan 30, 2010