plant
Part of speech: noun
verb
Morphological type: simple
Topics: ball-games
biology
botany
ecology
games
hobbies
lifestyle
natural-sciences
snooker
sports
Etymology: From Middle English plante, from Old English plante (“young tree or shrub, herb newly planted”), from Proto-West Germanic *plantu, from Latin planta (“sprout, shoot, cutting”). Broader sense of "any vegetable life, vegetation generally" is from Old French plante. Doublet of clan (borrowed through Celtic languages) and planta (directly from Latin).
The verb is from Middle English planten, from Old English plantian (“to plant”), from Latin plantāre, later influenced by Old French planter. Compare also Dutch planten (“to plant”), German pflanzen (“to plant”), Swedish plantera (“to plant”), Icelandic planta (“to plant”).
The factory and machinery senses comes from the Latin sense of "any vegetable production that serves to propagate the species," which refers to something that produces.
Inflected forms:
form: plants
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: plants
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: planting
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: planted
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: planted
pos: verb
tags: past
Senses:
gloss: An organism that is not an animal, especially an organism capable of photosynthesis, and typically a small or herbaceous organism of this kind, rather than a tree.
pos: noun
examples: The garden had a couple of trees, and a cluster of colourful plants around the border.
In plants, the ability to recognize self from nonself plays an important role in fertilization, because self-fertilization will result in less diverse offspring than fertilization with pollen from another individual. Many genes with reproductive roles also have antibacterial and immune functions, which indicate that the threat of microbial attack on the sperm or egg may be a major influence on rapid evolution during reproduction.
gloss: An organism of the kingdom Plantae, and now specifically, a living organism of the Embryophyta (land plants) or of the Chlorophyta (green algae), a eukaryote that includes double-membraned chloroplasts in its cells containing chlorophyll a and b, or any organism closely related to such an organism.
pos: noun
gloss: Now specifically, a multicellular eukaryote that includes chloroplasts in its cells, which have a cell wall.
pos: noun
gloss: A young tree, vine, shrub, or herb; a sapling.
pos: noun
tags: archaic
examples: Take, Shepherd, take a Plant of ſtubborn Oak; / And labour him with many a ſturdy ſtroke: / Or with hard Stones, demoliſh from afar / His haughty Creſt, the feat of all the War.
gloss: Any creature that grows on soil or similar surfaces, including plants and fungi.
pos: noun
tags: proscribed
examples: Some plants, such as mushrooms found in the wild, are difficult to identify. Some plants are poisonous, and an inexperienced individual may make mistakes in identification of wild plants, with tragic results.
gloss: A factory or other industrial or institutional building or facility.
pos: noun
tags: countable
examples: The company has production plants in three countries.
My dad worked at the plant for 27 years.
The US group does have another vaccine plant in Ireland – in Carlow – but it is understood the Dundalk site is the only live virus vaccine facility in MSD’s Irish network.
gloss: Machinery and other supplies and equipment, such as the kind used in heavy industry, light industry, earthmoving, or construction.
pos: noun
tags: uncountable
examples: Near-synonym: capital equipment
industrial plant
refrigeration plant
A massive amount of plant has been trucked in and installed over the past two years, and production is expected to begin soon.
gloss: The equipment and work animals of a drover or other rural worker travelling through the countryside.
pos: noun
tags: Australia
examples: Nigger smoke-talks had told him of the patrol and of Felix’s mustering plant. Once he had absorbed the ‘outside’ news the night’s new the conversation started in earnest.
gloss: An object placed surreptitiously in order to cause suspicion to fall upon a person.
pos: noun
examples: That gun’s not mine! It’s a plant! I’ve never seen it before!
gloss: A stash or cache of hidden goods.
pos: noun
tags: obsolete
slang
gloss: Anyone assigned to behave as a member of the public during a covert operation (as in a police investigation).
pos: noun
gloss: A person, placed amongst an audience, whose role is to cause confusion, laughter etc.
pos: noun
gloss: A play in which the cue ball knocks one (usually red) ball onto another, in order to pot the second; a set.
pos: noun
examples: O’Sullivan risked a plant that went badly astray, splitting the reds.
The company's product range includes tools, construction plant, diggers, dumpers and rollers.
gloss: The sole of the foot.
pos: noun
tags: obsolete
examples: Knotty legs, and plants of clay, / Seek for eaſe, or love delay.
gloss: A plan; a swindle; a trick.
pos: noun
tags: dated
slang
examples: It wasn’t a bad plant that of mine, on Fikey, the man accused of forging the Sou’ Westeru Railway debentures—it was only t’ other day—because the reason why? I’ll tell you.
Now, Max, by what combination of circumstances is a rogue to know my password, to be able to forge my signature, to possess himself of my key, and to resemble me personally? And, finally, how is he possibly to determine beforehand whether there is anything in my safe to repay so elaborate a plant?
gloss: An oyster which has been bedded, in distinction from one of natural growth.
pos: noun
gloss: A young oyster suitable for transplanting.
pos: noun
tags: US
dialectal
gloss: A system, such as a motor, whose behaviour is being regulated or controlled by a control system.
pos: noun
gloss: A position in the street to sell from; a pitch.
pos: noun
tags: UK
obsolete
slang
gloss: To place (a seed or plant) in soil or other substrate in order that it may live and grow.
pos: verb
tags: ambitransitive
gloss: To furnish or supply with plants.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: to plant a garden, an orchard, or a forest
His father had given him a little square bed in a corner of the garden, which he had planted with corn two days before.
With your mouse, you plant a garden by selecting plants from a database of 450 of the most common flowers, shrubs, and trees.
gloss: To place (an object, or sometimes a person), often with the implication of intending deceit.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: That gun’s not mine! It was planted there by the real murderer!
Not only that, I thought, but cynics would now theorise that the interview piece was a PR exercise, a planted story designed as damage-limitation in the event that some probing journalist revealed all about the love nest.
gloss: To place or set something firmly or with conviction.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: to plant cannon against a fort; to plant a flag; to plant one’s feet on solid ground
Plant your feet firmly and give the rope a good tug.
First Anelka curled a shot wide from just outside the box, then Lampard planted a header over the bar from Bosingwa's cross.
gloss: To place in the ground.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: God moves in a myſterious way, / His wonders to perform; / He plants his footſteps in the ſea, / And rides upon the ſtorm.
Sarah, she kissed each of her grandparents on the forehead. They were planted in a graveyard behind the church.
gloss: To engender; to generate; to set the germ of.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: It engenders choler, planteth anger.
gloss: To furnish with a fixed and organized population; to settle; to establish.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: to plant a colony
planting of countries like planting of woods
gloss: To introduce and establish the principles or seeds of.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: to plant Christianity among the heathen
gloss: To set up; to install; to instate.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: We will plant some other in the throne.
Synonyms: plant
Related words: plantation
Derived words: air plant
Albany pitcher plant
antiplant
ant-plant
ant plant
artillery plant
ashplant
assembly plant
assplant
asthma-plant
Australian pitcher plant
balloon plant
basket plant
batching plant
bedding plant
button plant
California pitcher plant
canoe plant
caricature plant
cast-iron plant
castor oil plant
century plant
chameleon plant
chandelier plant
chemical plant
chenille plant
coal plant
combined cycle power plant
compass plant
cone plant
container plant
control-plant
cooling plant
coral plant
corpse plant
cup-and-saucer plant
cup plant
curry plant
cushion plant
dancing plant
deplant
dinosaur plant
displant
dove plant
eggplant
egg-plant
elbow plant
eternity plant
explant
face-plant
fiber plant
firecracker plant
fire plant
flowering plant
food plant
fried-egg plant
friendship plant
gas plant
ghost plant
ginger beer plant
glue plant
gnome plant
goldfish plant
Good Friday plant
gopher plant
gout plant
grapple plant
hand plant
hedgehog plant
honey plant
honey-plant
host plant
house plant
houseplant
humble plant
hypocrite plant
ice-plant
ice plant
icicle plant
indoor plant
industry plant
insulin plant
intraplant
jade plant
jelly plant
joypowder plant
jumping plant louse
larval food plant
leadplant
life plant
lipstick plant
macroplant
megaplant
Mexican hat plant
Mickey Mouse plant
microplant
mimicry plant
money plant
monument plant
mosquito plant
mother plant
multiplant
nonplant
non-vascular plant
nosebleed plant
nuclear power plant
nuke plant
obedient plant
oyster plant
packing plant
palmoplantar
peaker plant
pebble plant
physical plant
phys plant
pickle plant
pieplant
pie plant
piggyback plant
pilot plant
pitcher plant
planimal
plantage
plantal
plant-animal
plantar
plant a seed
plant-based
plant bug
plant butter
plant-cane
plant community
plantcutter
plant eater
plant-eater
plant-eating
planter
plant food
plantgating
planthood
planthopper
plant hormone
plant-house
planthropology
plantibody
plantivorous
plantkin
plantkind
plant kingdom
plantless
plantlet
plantlife
plantlike
plantling
plant litter
plant louse
plant-louse
plantly
plant milk
plant morphology
plantness
plantocracy
plant one's feet
plant parent
plant point
plant pot
plant room
plant science
plantscraper
plant sit
plant-sit
plantsman
plantsperson
plantstand
plantstuff
plantswoman
plant teacher
plantwide
plantwise
poison dart plant
poker plant
polka-dot plant
pot-plant
potted plant
prayer plant
purple velvet plant
radiator plant
rainbow plant
regasification plant
resurrection plant
rice-paper plant
roast-beef plant
rock plant
root plant
rouge-plant
rubber plant
sailor plant
scorpion plant
sea-plant
seed plant
semaphore plant
sensitive plant
sewage plant
shame plant
shoebutton plant
shoo-fly plant
shrimp plant
snake plant
snow plant
soap plant
spider plant
superplant
Swiss cheese plant
switch-plant
tarnished plant bug
tea oil plant
tea plant
telegraph plant
thunder-plant
toothache plant
toot plant
trigger plant
triggerplant
umbrella plant
unicorn plant
vascular plant
velcro plant
vinegar plant
vitroplant
wallplant
washplant
water plant
waterwheel plant
wax plant
West Australian pitcher plant
Western Australian pitcher plant
wind power plant
World's Fair plant
zebra plant
ZZ plant
interplant
misplant
outplant
preplant
faceplant
handplant
nonplanted
overplant
plantable
plant foot
plant out
replant
underplant
unplant
unplanted
Translations: