Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A coniferous evergreen tree (Araucaria araucana) native to Chile and Argentina, having whorled branches covered with scalelike, overlapping, sharp-pointed leaves.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The Chili pine, Araucaria imbricata.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Perhaps from the obstacle its intertwined branches would pose.]

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Examples

  • It looks much as EZ describes it, except that there is no longer a monkey-puzzle tree.

    Archive 2009-03-01 Jean 2009

  • On my last day in motion pictures I found myself at the top of a monkey-puzzle tree in England, helping to settle a wager between that marvelous light comedian and wit Rex Harrison and his wife, the actress Rachel Roberts, and thinking, This is gonna look great in the obituaries, isn't it?

    'Me Cheeta: My Life in Hollywood' 2009

  • Next to it, a new HQ for the city's daily newspaper was at present a giant monkey-puzzle of steel girders.

    Excerpt: Set In Darkness by Ian Rankin 2000

  • Next to it, a new HQ for the city's daily newspaper was at present a giant monkey-puzzle of steel girders.

    Set in Darkness Rankin, Ian 2000

  • She climbed into the tree house and planted a monkey-puzzle tree.

    Dragon on a Pedestal Anthony, Piers 1983

  • Irene climbed on up and into her monkey-puzzle chamber.

    Dragon on a Pedestal Anthony, Piers 1983

  • The view was much the same as that seen from the bathroom, only that instead of grass and flower-beds there was a gravel sweep, and, just opposite the front door, a circle of grass with a tall monkey-puzzle tree in the centre.

    The Invader A Novel

  • "He's a sort of walking monkey-puzzle, I guess," said the voice, and a roguish laugh followed the words.

    The Odds And Other Stories 1910

  • The laws which regulate the shape of a chalk down or an ivy tendril are just as severe as the laws which regulate the monkey-puzzle tree or the talc crystal.

    The Silent Isle Arthur Christopher Benson 1893

  • The moon is a-shinin 'in the monkey-puzzle tree! "

    King Coal : a Novel Upton Sinclair 1923

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