Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. An evergreen holly (Ilex vomitoria) of the southeast United States, having lustrous red or sometimes yellow fruit, whose dried leaves are used to make a bitter tea. Also called cassina.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Same as yapon.
Wiktionary
- n. The yaupon holly, Ilex vomitoria, an evergreen holly shrub with white flowers and red or yellow berries, found in the southeastern United States.
- n. A tea-like drink, "black drink", brewed from the leaves of this holly (or, sometimes, Ilex cassine).
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. (Bot.) A shrub (Ilex Cassine) of the Holly family, native from Virginia to Florida. The smooth elliptical leaves are used as a substitute for tea, and were formerly used in preparing the black drink of the Indians of North Carolina. Called also
South-Sea tea .
Etymologies
- From Catawba yąpą, from yą (wood, tree) + pą (leaf). (Wiktionary)
- Catawba yã´pã. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“We plant, use feeders and even create deer trails through the thick yaupon bushes. without creating trails the brush can be so thick a rabbit couldn't get through it much less a deer.”
“The grizzled leader hunched like a porcupine and peered through a screen of yaupon leaves, the crossbow held low before him.”
“Ronnie's boss had sent him over to clear out some of the thick yaupon and gall berry bushes around the house to give our longleaf pines a fighting chance.”
“A thick understory of yaupon and eastern redcedar occurs in some parts.”
“The maritime forests include live oak, laurel oak, loblolly pine, red cedar, yaupon holly, wax myrtle, dwarf palmetto, with cabbage palm (Sabal palmetto) in the south.”
“Other plants found commonly within the reserve include Spanish moss, resurrection fern, prickly pear, saw palmetto, sabal palmetto, yaupon holly, red cedar, smilax and sweet grass.”
“The house went up like a parcel of brittle old love letters, the flames growing hotter and redder, red as yaupon berries, red as lung blood.”
“Onto this green emptiness houses as awe-inspiring as the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus would appear in groves of oak and yaupon.”
“His name in Hitchiti was As-se-se-he-ho-lar or Asiyahola, which is what the Seminoles called the Black Drink, the sacramental tea brewed out of holly and yaupon leaves.”
“We were only there three years so my own garden was still young, although we were loaded with pine trees and yaupon hollies.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘yaupon’.
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nachchba's Words
stentorian, blasé, ennui, concinnity, melee, photokeratitis, skiffle, refulgence, mongrel, fakir, caid, eudaimonia and 215 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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Rabindranath Not Included
i can't never forget thiccyn's!
bubaline, dezinkhornifistib..., hirundine, bee veil, cuckoo spit, resistentialism, hobthrush, burniebee, hookem-snivey, fattiehead, mompyns, mons and 142 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for yaupon.
chained_bear "There was a grunting somewhere near; a small pig burst out of a patch of yaupon and crossed his path, heading to the left."
—Diana Gabaldon, The Fiery Cross (NY: Bantam Dell, 2001), 1062 Jan 28, 2010
hernesheir cf. black drink, holly Jan 12, 2009