clove
pronunciation
How to pronounce clove in British English:
UK [kləʊv]
How to pronounce clove in American English:
US [kloʊv]
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- Noun:
- aromatic flower bud of a clove tree; yields a spice
- moderate sized very symmetrical red-flowered evergreen widely cultivated in the tropics for its flower buds which are source of cloves
- one of the small bulblets that can be split off of the axis of a larger garlic bulb
- spice from dried unopened flower bud of the clove tree; used whole or ground
Word Origin
- clove
- clove: There are two distinct words clove in English. In clove of garlic [OE] the underlying notion is of ‘cutting’; the head of garlic is as it were ‘divided up’ into separate sections. The word goes back ultimately to the Indo-European base *gleubh- ‘cut, carve’, which also produced English cleave and its now archaic past tense clove. Clove the spice [14] originated in the Old French phrase clou de girofle, which meant literally ‘nail of the clove-tree’.The term ‘nail’ was applied to the tree’s dried unopened flower bud because of a perceived resemblance in shape. (French clou ‘nail’ comes from Latin clāvus, source of English cloy, and French girofle – whence English gillyflower [14], which originally meant ‘clove’ – goes back via medieval Latin caryophyllum to Greek karuóphullon, which literally meant ‘nut leaf’.)=> cleave; cloy, gillyflower
- clove (n.1)
- dried flowerbud of a certain tropical tree, used as a spice, late 15c., earlier clowes (14c.), from Anglo-French clowes de gilofre (c. 1200), Old French clou de girofle "nail of gillyflower," so called from its shape, from Latin clavus "a nail" (see slot (n.2)). For second element, see gillyflower. The two cloves were much confused in Middle English. The clove pink is so called from the scent of the flowers.
- clove (n.2)
- "slice of garlic," Old English clufu "clove (of garlic), bulb, tuber," from Proto-Germanic *klubo "cleft, thing cloven," from PIE *gleubh- "to tear apart, cleave" (see cleave (v.1)). Its Germanic cognates mostly lurk in compounds that translate as "clove-leek," such as Old Saxon clufloc, Old High German chlobilouh. Dissimilation produced Dutch knoflook, German knoblauch.
Example
- 1. Chaney sparked a clove cigarette and considered the story .
- 2. Tommy , a son , controlled the clove trade .
- 3. Slice open a clove of raw , fresh garlic and apply it to breakouts as a home remedy for acne .
- 4. Both companies saw sales volumes increase in indonesia last year-mainly for kretek clove cigarettes , which account for over 90 % of the indonesian market .
- 5. Don 't laugh , but in aromatherapy , they warn you never to light a lemon-cinnamon candle at the same time you light a clove candle and a cedar-nutmeg candle .