Link Centre Dictionary

yew

UK/juː/ US/jʉw/ rare

noun

1.

wood of a yew; especially the durable fine-grained light brown or red wood of the English yew valued for cabinetwork and archery bows

2.

any of numerous evergreen trees or shrubs having red cup-shaped berries and flattened needlelike leaves

Origin

From Middle English ew, from Old English īw, ēow, [both cognates of Welsh yw (“yews”), Irish eo, Old Irish eó respectively]; although the Old English form was conjectured to be from Proto-West Germanic *īhu, from Proto-Germanic *īhwaz (compare Icelandic ýr), masculine variant of *īwō (compare Dutch ijf, German Eibe), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁eyHw-. See also Hittite 𒄑𒂊𒅀𒀭 (eyan, “type of evergreen”), Latgalian īva (“bird cherry”), Lithuanian ievà (“bird cherry”), Russian и́ва (íva, “willow”). Compare typologically Ancient Greek τόξον (tóxon), possibly a cognate of Latin taxus.

Phrases

  • Anglojap yew
  • Canadian yew
  • catkin yew
  • Chilean plum yew
  • Chinese yewcommon yew
  • European yew
  • Florida yew
  • Himalayan yew

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WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.