perennial
Part of speech: adj
noun
Morphological type: derivation
Topics: biology
botany
natural-sciences
Etymology: The adjective is borrowed from Latin perennis (“lasting through the whole year or for several years, perennial; continual, everlasting, perpetual”) + English -al (suffix meaning ‘of or pertaining to’ forming adjectives). Perennis is derived from per- (“completive or intensifying prefix with the sense of doing something all the way through or entirely”) + annus (“year; season, time”) (possibly ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₂et- (“to go”)). By surface analysis, per- + -ennial.
The noun is derived from the adjective.
Cognates
* Middle French pérenne (modern French pérenne (“lasting through the whole year, perennial”))
* Italian perenne (“lasting for a long time”)
* Spanish perenne (“eternal; permanent; a perennial plant”)
Inflected forms:
form: perennials
pos: noun
tags: plural
Senses:
gloss: Lasting or remaining active throughout the year, for multiple years, or all the time.
pos: adj
tags: not-comparable
examples: a perennial stream
[W]hat is most admirable is the vast enclosure, and variety of ground, in yᵉ large garden, containing vineyards, cornefields, meadows, groves (whereof one is of perennial greens), and walkes of vast lengthes, so accurately kept and cultivated, that nothing can be more agreeable.
And there is ſuch a thing as Subterraneous Heat, […] [a]s is manifeſt from the ſmoking of perennial Fountains in froſty VVeather, and VVater dravvn out of Pumps and open VVells.
It [the pond] is a clear and deep green well, half a mile long and a mile and three quarters in circumference, and contains about sixty-one and a half acres; a perennial spring in the midst of pine and oak woods, without any visible inlet or outlet except by the clouds and evaporation.
That desert's age the gorge may prove, / Piercing profound the mountain bare; / Yet hardly churned out in the groove / By a perennial wear and tear / Of floods; nay, dry it shows within; / But twice a year the waters flow, / Nor then in tide, but dribbling thin: […]
These offshore Sonoman mountains likely formed an orogenic (mountainous) barrier to moisture inland, resulting in a mountain-shadow onshore desert punctuated by regional annual and large basin perennial streams draining into a forearc saline sea.
gloss: Continuing without cessation or intermission for several years, or for an undetermined or infinite period; never-ending or never failing; perpetual, unceasing.
pos: adj
tags: figuratively
not-comparable
examples: His artwork has a perennial beauty.
There, on perennial Adamant deſign'd, / The various Fortunes of your Race you'll find: […]
Good humour may be defined a habit of being pleaſed, a conſtant and perennial ſoftneſs of manner, eaſineſs of approach, and ſuavity of diſpoſition; […]
The perennial exiſtence of bodies corporate and their fortunes, are things particularly ſuited to a man who has long views; who meditates deſigns that require time in faſhioning; and which propoſe duration when they are accompliſhed.
Has Ireland been governed in a 'wise and loving' manner? A government and guidance of white European men which has issued in perennial hunger of potatoes to the third man extant,—ought to drop a veil over its fact, and walk out of court under conduct of proper officers; saying no word; expecting now of a surety sentence either to change or die.
She has a large gold eye-glass, has Lady Tippins, to survey the proceedings with. If she had one in each eye, it might keep that other drooping lid up, and look more uniform. But perennial youth is in her artificial flowers, and her list of lovers is full.
Her name was Liberty! Earth lay before her, / And throbbed unconscious fealty and truth; / Morning and night men hastened to adore her, / And from her eyes Peace drew perennial youth.
gloss: Appearing or recurring again and again; recurrent.
pos: adj
tags: figuratively
not-comparable
examples: a perennial candidate in elections
Change is a perennial theme in politics.
Ludgate Hill is not Moirosi’s Mountain, but, after all, is only a gentle ascent of about half an inch in the foot, over a length of about two hundred yards, up which unshod omnibus horses would trot with a full load in any weather. Yet there it must remain, a chief thoroughfare in the heart of London, a perennial cause of complaint, and of fear, disgust, and injury to man and horse.
Of all the questions which, throughout the centuries, have escaped from the lips of man, there is none which has been asked with such persistence, none which has possessed interest more perennial, than "Whence do I come? Whither shall I go?" Man's origin, man's hereafter, have ever been of intensest interest to man.
gloss: Appearing or recurring again and again; recurrent.
pos: adj
tags: figuratively
not-comparable
rare
gloss: Of a plant: active throughout the year, or having a life cycle of more than two growing seasons.
pos: adj
tags: not-comparable
gloss: A plant that is active throughout the year, or has a life cycle of more than two growing seasons.
pos: noun
examples: One would have supposed from the appearance of the country at the end of the first season after the eruption that practically all plants except the trees and bushes had been destroyed, and that revegetation must be due to new seedlings started on the ash. Such, however, is not the case. Excavation of the root systems of the new plants shows that they are old perennials which have come through the ash from the old soil.
gloss: A thing that lasts forever.
pos: noun
tags: broadly
gloss: A person or thing (such as a problem) that appears or returns regularly.
pos: noun
tags: broadly
examples: Some of the stars on our list are perennials who fill huge venues year after year after year, but there's also a returning superstar on our list of the hottest summer tours of 2019.
Related words: perennate
perennating
perennation
perennious
perennity
Derived words: nonperennial
perennialism
perennialist
perenniality
perennialization
perennialize
perennially
perennialness
perennial philosophy
perenniation
hardy perennial
Translations:
lang: Danish
word: tilbagevendende
lang: Finnish
word: toistuva
lang: German
word: wiederkehrend
lang: Italian
word: ricorrente
lang: Polish
word: częsty
lang: Polish
word: powracający
lang: Polish
word: powtarzający się
lang: Russian
word: повторя́ющийся
roman: povtorjájuščijsja
lang: Russian
word: возвраща́ющийся
roman: vozvraščájuščijsja
lang: Turkish
word: periodik
lang: Turkish
word: yinelenen