Definitions

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

  • noun Any of several tall fan-leaved palm trees of the genus Borassus, especially B. flabellifer of tropical Asia, valued for its sweet sap.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun An East Indian palm, Borassus flabelliformis.
  • noun [capitalized] In zoology, the typical genus of Palmyridæ. P. aurifera is a beautiful species, with gold-colored parapodia two inches long.

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

  • noun (Bot.) A species of palm (Borassus flabelliformis) having a straight, black, upright trunk, with palmate leaves. It is found native along the entire northern shores of the Indian Ocean, from the mouth of the Tigris to New Guinea. More than eight hundred uses to which it is put are enumerated by native writers. Its wood is largely used for building purposes; its fruit and roots serve for food, its sap for making toddy, and its leaves for thatching huts.

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

  • noun A palm, Borassus flabelliformis, with straight black upright trunk and palmate leaves, whose wood, fruit, and roots can be used for many purposes.

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

  • noun tall fan palm of Africa and India and Malaysia yielding a hard wood and sweet sap that is a source of palm wine and sugar; leaves used for thatching and weaving

Etymologies

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

[Alteration (influenced by Palmyra) of Portuguese palmeira, from palma, palm tree, from Latin; see palm.]

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Examples

  • The banyan which they had chosen as their shelter was not one of the largest -- being only a young tree, but out of its top rose the huge fan-shaped leaves of a palm-tree of the kind known as the palmyra palm (_Borassus flagelliformis_).

    The Plant Hunters Adventures Among the Himalaya Mountains Mayne Reid 1850

  • It was found that these same dyes (especially the 1: 2 metal complex dyes) were, in general, also largely suitable for other palm leaves such as palmyra (Borassus flabellifer) and doum palm (Hyphaene spp.), pandanus leaves and vetiver grass.

    Chapter 7 1983

  • The fruit of palmyra tree that is mistakenly called “Sea Coconut” (Nonggu in Tamil) (Borassus flabellifers), which is available during hot and dry season in Penang, South India, Thailand, and a few more countries near the equator, is extremely alkaline.

    Global Voices in English » India: Swine Flu Scare 2009

  • On a sandy street on the northern shore of the Jaffna Peninsula in Sri Lanka, an innocuous building surrounded by mango and palmyra trees houses a rehabilitation center run by a Catholic priest, who in January 2005 just days after the tsunami began to counsel survivors.

    Heartbreak in Post-War Jaffna Adele Barker 2010

  • On a sandy street on the northern shore of the Jaffna Peninsula in Sri Lanka, an innocuous building surrounded by mango and palmyra trees houses a rehabilitation center run by a Catholic priest, who in January 2005 just days after the tsunami began to counsel survivors.

    Adele Barker: Heartbreak in Post-War Jaffna 2010

  • Any consciousness by which one describing the Tathagata would describe him: That the Tathagata has abandoned, its root destroyed, made like a palmyra stump, deprived of the conditions of development, not destined for future arising.

    A Verb for Nirvana by Thanissaro Bhikkhu William Harryman 2009

  • Even so, Vaccha, any physical form by which one describing the Tathagata would describe him: That the Tathagata has abandoned, its root destroyed, made like a palmyra stump, deprived of the conditions of development, not destined for future arising.

    A Verb for Nirvana by Thanissaro Bhikkhu William Harryman 2009

  • Naakan was too poor to own land; but he earned his living by taking on lease some coconut and palmyra trees, tapping and selling the toddy.

    Archive 2008-05-01 Jan 2008

  • Naakan was too poor to own land; but he earned his living by taking on lease some coconut and palmyra trees, tapping and selling the toddy.

    The Tale of a Broken Pot Jan 2008

  • Constructed entirely from locally sourced and sustainably harvested palmyra, the home is sited on a working coconut plantation in the West Indian coastal town of Alibaug.

    Palmyra House by Studio Mumbai | Inhabitat 2008

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