turpentine

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A thin volatile essential oil, C₁₀H₁₆, obtained by steam distillation or other means from the wood or exudate of certain pine trees and used as a paint thinner, solvent, and medicinally as a liniment. Also called oil of turpentine, spirit of turpentine.
2. n. The sticky mixture of resin and volatile oil from which turpentine is distilled.
3. n. A brownish-yellow resinous liquid obtained from the terebinth.
4. v. To apply turpentine to or mix turpentine with.
5. v. To extract turpentine from (a tree).

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. To make or gather turpentine.
2. n. An oleoresinous substance secreted by the wood or bark of a number of trees, all coniferous except the terebinth, which yields Chian turpentine. It consists chiefly of an essential hydrocarbon oil (C₁₀H₁₆) and a resin called colophony or rosin. The common turpentine is derived in France from the maritime pine, Pinus maritima (French or Bordeaux turpentine); in Russia and Germany, from the Scotch pine, P. sylvestris; in Austria and Corsica, from the Corsican pine, P. Laricio; in the East Indies and Japan, from several pines; and in the United States, most largely in North Carolina, from the southern or long-leafed pine, P. palustris, and somewhat from the loblollypine, P. Tæda. For other turpentines, see the phrases below. In the United States turpentine is obtained by cutting a pocket in the side of the tree (boxing), whence it is periodically collected. In France the less destructive method is practised of removing a piece of bark and conducting the flow into earthen vessels. The crude turpentine is subjected to distillation, separating the oil, or so-called spirit or spirits of turpentine, from the rosin—the oil in the case of the long-leafed pine constituting, it is said, 17 per cent., and in the case of the maritime pine 24 per cent. This when pure is limpid and colorless, of a penetrating peculiar odor, and a pungent bitterish taste. Spirit of turpentine is very extensively used in mixing paints and varnishes. In medicine it is stimulant and diuretic, an anthelmintic, and externally a rubefacient and counter-irritant.
3. n. The oil or spirit of turpentine; turps: an ordinary but less precise use.
4. To apply turpentine to; rub with turpentine.

Wiktionary

1. n. a volatile essential oil obtained from the wood of pine trees by steam distillation; it is a complex mixture of monoterpenes; it is used as a solvent and paint thinner

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. A semifluid or fluid oleoresin, primarily the exudation of the terebinth, or turpentine, tree (Pistacia Terebinthus), a native of the Mediterranean region. It is also obtained from many coniferous trees, especially species of pine, larch, and fir.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. volatile liquid distilled from turpentine oleoresin; used as paint thinner and solvent and medicinally
2. n. obtained from conifers (especially pines)