Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A stone of the hardness and grain of marble.
  • noun The sweetbrier, Rosa rubiginosa. It flowers in June and July, and grows in dry, bushy places.
  • noun The wild rose or dogrose, Rosa canina.

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

  • noun A species of rose (Rosa Eglanteria), with fragrant foliage and flowers of various colors.
  • noun The sweetbrier (R. rubiginosa).

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

  • noun A Eurasian rose, Rosa eglanteria, having prickly stems, fragrant leaves, pink flowers and red hips

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

  • noun Eurasian rose with prickly stems and fragrant leaves and bright pink flowers followed by scarlet hips

Etymologies

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

[Middle English eglentin, from Old French eglantine, diminutive of aiglent, from Vulgar Latin *aculentum, from neuter of *aculentus, spiny, from Latin aculeus, spine, from acus, needle; see ak- in Indo-European roots.]

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Examples

  • The pale primrose, that flower most like thy face; the bluebell, like thy clear veins; and the leaf of eglantine, which is not sweeter than was thy breath; all these will I strew over thee.

    Cymbeline 1878

  • The pale primrose, that flower most like thy face; the blue-bell, like thy clear veins; and the leaf of eglantine, which is not sweeter than was thy breath; all these will I strew over thee.

    Tales from Shakespeare Mary Lamb 1805

  • The pale primrose, that flower most like thy face; the blue-bell, like thy clear veins; and the leaf of eglantine, which is not sweeter than was thy breath; all these will I strew over thee.

    Tales from Shakespeare Mary Lamb 1805

  • Naturally he loves ‘the sweet smell of different flowers’ … he notes the sweetness of the violet, the eglantine (sweet briar) and the damask rose; but it is suggestive that in his most sustained and exquisite appreciation of the rose, what chiefly appeals to him is the fact that, unlike other flowers, roses even when faded never smell badly, but that

    Flowers, Shakespeare, and the horror of bad smells 2009

  • Naturally he loves ‘the sweet smell of different flowers’ … he notes the sweetness of the violet, the eglantine (sweet briar) and the damask rose; but it is suggestive that in his most sustained and exquisite appreciation of the rose, what chiefly appeals to him is the fact that, unlike other flowers, roses even when faded never smell badly, but that

    2009 September 19 | NIGEL BEALE NOTA BENE BOOKS 2009

  • We walked slowly so that I could keep an eye out for late-blooming eglantine and teasel heads, chatting casually.

    Sick Cycle Carousel 2010

  • Tansy and eglantine had taken root in the cracks, and waved in precarious yellow flags against the stone.

    Sick Cycle Carousel 2010

  • He appended the appellation d'Églantine to his surname in a hoax in which he claimed to have won a golden eglantine in a literary contest.

    Names 2007

  • Within this tent was a closet containing the carpet of the lord Solomon (on whom be peace!); and the pavilion was compassed about with a vast garden full of fruit trees and streams; while near the palace were beds of roses and basil and eglantine and all manner sweet-smelling herbs and flowers.

    The Book of The Thousand Nights And A Night 2006

  • Past the eglantine, the briars and the bloodgrass?

    The Best American Poetry 2008 2008

Comments

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  • I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows,

    Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows:

    Quite over-canopied with lush woodbine,

    With sweet musk roses and with eglantine.

    - William Shakespeare, 'A Violet Bank'.

    November 12, 2008