Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A rock-rose; a plant of the genus Cistus.
  • noun [capitalized] A genus of plants of many species, belonging to the natural order Cistaceæ, natives of Europe, or of the countries bordering the Mediterranean; the rock-roses.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun a genus of small to medium-sized evergreen shrubs of southern Europe and northern Africa.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A rock-rose; a plant of the genus Cistus.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun small to medium-sized evergreen shrubs of southern Europe and North Africa

Etymologies

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Examples

  • and plants from tropical regions including certain palms can be surprisingly winter hardy, but plants from the Mediterranean such as cistus and rosemary have increased vulnerability and are much more unreliable.

    Telegraph.co.uk - Telegraph online, Daily Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph 2011

  • Oeillet opens juicy and citrusy and with a definite hit of sage, cistus and galbanum absolute that gush out and breathes like drips of blood and wine on earth.

    Archive 2009-03-01 Ayala Sender 2009

  • Oeillet opens juicy and citrusy and with a definite hit of sage, cistus and galbanum absolute that gush out and breathes like drips of blood and wine on earth.

    Lady in the Dark Ayala Sender 2009

  • Opening with labdanum, cistus oil, olibanum AKA frankincense and smoky notes of guiacwood and burning cedarwood, the scent gradually softens but remains rather linear and unchanging.

    Archive 2007-03-01 Ayala Sender 2007

  • Opening with labdanum, cistus oil, olibanum AKA frankincense and smoky notes of guiacwood and burning cedarwood, the scent gradually softens but remains rather linear and unchanging.

    Le Labo's Vetiver 46 Ayala Sender 2007

  • Vanilla and rum add sweetness, and woods and cistus add an underlining pine-like masculinity that is maintained through out the composition.

    Archive 2006-10-01 Ayala Sender 2006

  • I know not; the cistus is brown now, the rest all deep or brilliant green.

    Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin 2005

  • Left, gold wreath of flowering myrtle dating to the fourth century B.C. from a funerary cistus in a tumulus at Evropos, Kilkis (Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki) Right, a silver wine jug (Museum of the Royal Tombs of Aigai, Vergina) [LARGERIMAGE]

    Great Alexander in New York 2005

  • Flower beds along the front held lavender, rosemary, and cistus -- three of the few shrubs that the deer would leave alone.

    Angel With No Hands Adams, Stephen 2005

  • As we brushed through them, the gummy leaves of a cistus stuck to the clothes; and with its small white flower and yellow heart, stood for our English dog-rose.

    Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin 2005

Comments

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  • See also: rockrose

    April 4, 2007

  • "...the sun blazed on the various kinds of broom in flower, upon the Rock, upon the cistuses and giant heath..."

    --Patrick O'Brian, The Hundred Days, 1

    March 20, 2008

  • "How did he manage to make a living in the sparse thin grass of that stony, sun-beaten landscape, so severe and parched, with no more cover than a few tumbles of pale stone, a few low creeping hook-thorned caper-bushes and a cistus whose name Stephen did not know?"

    Master and Commander by Patrick O'Brian, p 53 of the Norton paperback edition

    July 8, 2019