Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Any of various thorny shrubs of the genus Astragalus, especially A. gummifer, of the Middle East, yielding a gum used in pharmacy, adhesives, and textile printing.
- n. The gum of this plant.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A mucilaginous substance, the product of several low, spiny shrubs of the genus Astragalus, among them A. gummifer. A. eriostylus, A. adscendens, A. brachycalyx, and A. microcephalus, plants found in the mountains of Asia Minor and neighboring lands. The gum is not a secretion of the sap, but a transformation of the cells of the pith and medullary rays. It exudes through natural fissures and through incisions, forming respectively vermicelli and leaf or flake tragacanth. It is without smell, and nearly tasteless. Its characteristic, though not largest, element is bassorin. In water it swells and disintegrates into an adhesive paste, but, except a small portion, does not dissolve. Tragacanth Is emollient and demulcent, little given internally, however, on account of its insolubility. Its chief use in pharmacy is to impart firmness to pills, lozenges, etc. It is also made into a mucilage, particularly for marbling books, and is used as a stiffening for crapes, calicoes, etc. Also called gum dragon, dracanth, and (frequently) gum tragacanth.
Wiktionary
- n. a polysaccharide gum, extracted from several species of leguminous plants of the genus Astragalus, used as a food additive
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. A kind of gum procured from a spiny leguminous shrub (Astragalus gummifer) of Western Asia, and other species of Astragalus. It comes in hard whitish or yellowish flakes or filaments, and is nearly insoluble in water, but slowly swells into a mucilaginous mass, which is used as a substitute for gum arabic in medicine and the arts. Called also
gum tragacanth .
WordNet 3.0
- n. a gum used in pharmacy, adhesives, and textile printing
Etymologies
- Latin tragacantha, from Greek tragakantha : tragos, goat + akantha, thorn. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“And the colors: I was certain that Martha Stewart, who had recently featured Necco wafers on a wedding cake (historically apt; the pièces montées that made Marie-Antoine Carême perhaps the first star chef, in the early 19th century, were made of gum tragacanth, the base of Necco wafers and still the base of many wedding-cake decorations), would be designing a line of paints around them.”
“We know about chypre scents being made on the island as early as the 12thOyselets de Chypre Chypre Birds were formed from a paste of labdanum, styrax and calamus, mixed with tragacanth.”
“It and gum tragacanth are slightly soluble and eventually dissolve when chewed; they were used in early medicine as carriers that would release drugs slowly.”
Simon & Schuster: On Food and Cooking, The Science and Lore of the Kitchen
“Gum tragacanth, a carbohydrate from a West Asian shrub in the bean family Astragalus, has been used”
Simon & Schuster: On Food and Cooking, The Science and Lore of the Kitchen
“• Gum tragacanth, an exudate from various species of Astralagus shrubs”
Simon & Schuster: On Food and Cooking, The Science and Lore of the Kitchen
“When boiling water is poured over shavings of this wood a clear jelly, resembling tragacanth, is formed and becomes a thick viscid mass; iodine stains it brown, but not a trace of starch is indicated in it.”
Journal of an Expedition into the Interior of Tropical Australia
“Above, workers make flowers from pastillage, or gum paste dough, a mixture of sugar and gum tragacanth.”
“In the seventeenth century a variety of methods of construction were current for many kinds of food—for example, a marinade of chickens with lemon slices and fried parsley was piled up en pyramide, and so was whipped cream stiffened with gum tragacanth, but fruit was used most often.”
“Put the gum tragacanth and the rosewater in the bowl of an electric mixer or a marble mortar and stir them together.”
“These included glue, gelatine, mucilage (tragacanth), starch and dextrin, which are all applied in similar ways: for gelatine, the work is dipped in a hot solution containing 30 - 40 9 of gelatine for each litre then dried at moderate temperatures.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘tragacanth’.
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Old Pharmacy, etc.
This is not an Aubrey/Maturin list.
This is not an Aubrey/Maturin list.
This is not an Aubrey/Maturin list.
There. I think I've convinced myself.
(Of course...asafetida, Cinchona, Peruvian bark, Jesuit's bark, mithridate, aqua, bark, lard, electuary, gentian, diatessaron, myrrh and 110 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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Gums & Resins
Naturally occurring gums and resins.
amber, copal, dammar, mastic, sandarac, ammoniacum, gamboge, elemi, scammony, myrrh, turpentine, copaiba and 155 more...
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looked up
Words I've come across while reading and looked up in the dictionary.
deesis, pendentive, revetment, aedicule, stemma, patera, ephod, entrepot, corbel, exedra, volute, archivolt and 1408 more...
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richardr's Words
marmoreal, osteology, tyromancy, metalepsis, idioglossia, tapinosis, epicaricacy, carromancy, rogation, senex, aulic, gemütlichkeit and 279 more...
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ooh shiny
words I like with little or no rationalization
ventral, feverfew, axial, fend, murther, candela, helix, eruct, mayhem, lossy, weir, siphon and 61 more...
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TRivia's Words
Tweets
Looking for tweets for tragacanth.
bilby You have to admit gummifer's a pretty good word to just slip into a definition. Jan 16, 2013
knitandpurl "Composed of Paste and glued with Tragacanth, the Theme of this Device was an heroic Feat known as 'Callock's Leap'."
John Saturnall's Feast by Lawrence Norfolk, p 391 Nov 10, 2012