Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Any of numerous evergreen or deciduous trees or shrubs of the genus Ilex, especially several species having bright red berries and glossy evergreen leaves with spiny margins.
- noun Branches of these plants, traditionally used for Christmas decoration.
- noun Any of various similar or related plants.
from The Century Dictionary.
- An obsolete spelling of
wholly . - noun In Tasmania, a shrub of the madder family, Coprosma hirtella. See
coffee-berry , 2. - noun A plant of the genus Ilex, natural order Ilicineæ.
- noun The holm-oak, Quercus Ilex, an evergreen oak. Often called
holly-oak .
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Bot.) A tree or shrub of the genus Ilex. The European species (
Ilex Aquifolium ) is best known, having glossy green leaves, with a spiny, waved edge, and bearing berries that turn red or yellow about Michaelmas. - noun (Bot.) The holm oak. See 1st
Holm . - noun (Bot.) the black scrub oak. See
Scrub oak . - noun (Bot.) a West Indian shrub, with showy, yellow flowers (
Turnera ulmifolia ). - noun (Bot.) a species of Eryngium. See
Eryngium . - adverb obsolete Wholly.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Any of various
shrubs or (mostly) smalltrees , of the genusIlex , eitherevergreen ordeciduous , used asdecoration especially atChristmas . - noun The
wood from this tree. - noun Any of several
unrelated plantspecies likened to Ilex because of theirprickly ,evergreen foliage and/or round, bright-redberries
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun any tree or shrub of the genus Ilex having red berries and shiny evergreen leaves with prickly edges
- noun United States rock star (1936-1959)
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Now that the holly is finally decked out, many of you will doubtless be hustling to your favourite bookstores to pick up the latest books of the year.
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Now that the holly is finally decked out, many of you will doubtless be hustling to your favourite bookstores to pick up the latest books of the year.
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And … to celebrate this fine time, the StarShipSofa has decked herself out in holly, tinsel and mistletoe.
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Christmas holly is usually either English holly, Ilex aquifolium, which has spiny evergreen leaves and bright-red fruit, or American holly, Ilex opaca, which is similar but has duller, less spiny leaves.
An old chestnut, re-roasted ewillett 2007
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The word holly is an adulteration of the word holy.
Sacred Evergreens Joanna Waugh 2008
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The word holly is an adulteration of the word holy.
Archive 2008-12-01 Joanna Waugh 2008
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All that "deck the halls with boughs of holly" is realted to some European Pagans who believed the Holly King ruled the second (winter) half of the year, while the Oak King took over at the Summer Solstice.
Sound Politics: "Christmas trees are going back up at Sea-Tac airport." 2006
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The name holly fern suggests its resemblance to holly leaves with their bristle-tipped teeth.
The Fern Lover's Companion A Guide for the Northeastern States and Canada George Henry Tilton
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I've done it for Christmas – motto in holly, and all – and I've had my Easter lilies with a gorgeous star all daffodils in the middle.
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A gleaming circle wreathed in holly and drooping with vines end flowers stood out from a dark, in -
Three Girls in a Flat Jean Yandell Loughborough 1892
treeseed commented on the word holly
Holly Holy is a song by Neil Diamond that went to #6 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1969.
February 9, 2008
Logophile77 commented on the word holly
Have a holly, jolly Christmas. It means "Have a wholly jolly Christmas" (Holly is used as the adverb form, which means "wholly; entirely").
January 24, 2018