Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Biology Circular in cross section; cylindrical, sometimes with tapering ends.
from The Century Dictionary.
- Slender and smooth, with a circular transverse section; cylindrical or slightly tapering. See cut under
petiole .
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective Cylindrical and slightly tapering; columnar, as some stems of plants.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective Having a smooth
circular cross-section ;cylindrical .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- adjective especially of plant parts; cylindrical and tapering
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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A 1651 edition of Hernández included a carefully drawn figure and a Latin description that in its wording seemed positively modern: Ololiuqui, which some call coaxihuitl, or snake plant, is a twining herb with thin, green cordate leaves, slender green terete stems, and long white flowers.
One River Wade Davis 1996
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A 1651 edition of Hernández included a carefully drawn figure and a Latin description that in its wording seemed positively modern: Ololiuqui, which some call coaxihuitl, or snake plant, is a twining herb with thin, green cordate leaves, slender green terete stems, and long white flowers.
One River Wade Davis 1996
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The spikelets are one-to two-flowered, subsessile and subsecund on the branches which are produced as awn-like bristles beyond the ultimate spikelet, obscurely jointed and persistent on their obconic short pedicels, narrowly lanceolate and terete.
A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses K. Rangachari
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Branches numerous, composed of long, terete joints, rather thicker than a goose-quill, glaucous-green, slightly roughened on the surface, with depressions for the dot-like cushions.
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Rachis of spikes narrow, filiform, terete or angular.
A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses K. Rangachari
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The _inflorescence_ is a pyramidal panicle 1-1/2 to 4 inches long, erect on a terete glabrous peduncle 1-1/2 to 6 inches long, the main rachis is slender, erect, striate, glabrous and has glandular streaks just above the insertion of the branches of the lowest verticil.
A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses K. Rangachari
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-- A well-marked species in the size of its mammae, or tubercles, which are at least 1 in. long by 1/3 in. in diameter, terete, slightly curved, and narrowed to a pointed apex, the texture being very soft and watery.
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Cushions very close together, composed of short, white and yellowish bristles, and stout, terete spines, 1 in. or more long, set on little tubercles.
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Joints 1½ in. to 3 in. long, and a little less in width, terete, with very prominent tubercles and numerous tawny bristles; upper spines 1 in. to 1½ in. long, white, with a yellow point, shorter ones hair-like and curled.
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Its curiously and irregularly pinnate fronds are borne on slender stalks, terete toward the base, and covered with reddish brown, downy scales, instead of being produced loosely, as in most other Nephrolepises; these are densily crowded, and the outcome of closely clustered crowns.
Scientific American Supplement, No. 447, July 26, 1884 Various
biocon commented on the word terete
Terete also means rounded, smooth and round (Oxford English Dictionary).
August 13, 2011
qms commented on the word terete
Curiously the Word of the Day notification supplies the only definition of the five aggregated on the full entry page that omits mention of the "tapered at the ends" feature of terete structures.
May 11, 2016
qms commented on the word terete
Rodin was a sculptor complete,
Not least when he sat to excrete.
That exquisite shaper
Controlled so his taper
That each of his turds was terete.
May 11, 2016