toothwort
(ˈtuːθwɜːt)
[f. tooth n. + wort.]
Name given to several different plants.
1. Lathræa squamaria (N.O. Orobanchaceæ), a leafless fleshy herb, parasitic on the roots of hazel and other trees, bearing a double row of flesh-coloured drooping flowers, and having tooth-like scales upon the root-stock.
| 1597 Gerarde Herbal iii. clxiii. 1386 Great Toothwoorth, or Clownes Lungwoort..in forme like vnto Orobanche, or the Broome Rape,..hauing a tender, thicke, tuberous..bodie, consisting as it were of scales like teeth (whereof it tooke his name). 1778 G. White Selborne 3 July, Lathræa squammaria, tooth-wort. 1905 E. Step Wild Flowers I. 23 John Ray died exactly two hundred years ago, but the Toothwort still flourishes in Westhumble Lane [Mickleham]. |
† 2. A name for Shepherd's purse, Capsella Bursapastoris. Obs. rare.
| 1597 in Gerarde Herbal App. |
3. A plant of the genus Dentaria (N.O. Cruciferæ), characterized by tooth-like projections upon the creeping root-stock; esp. the British species D. bulbifera, occurring locally in woods; also called coralwort.
| 1668 Wilkins Real Char. ii. iv. §5. 100 Dames Violet, Double Rocket Toothwort. 1678 Phillips (ed. 4), Toothwort, a sort of Herb, called in Latin, Dentaria. 1786 Abercrombie Arr. in Gard. Assist. 73 Dentaria, toothwort. 1866 Treas. Bot. 393/2 Closely allied to Cardamine, from which it differs in having broad seed-stalks, and in its creeping roots being singularly toothed; hence the systematic name [Dentaria], and the English one of Toothwort. |
4. A name for Plumbago europæa and the Central American and West Indian P. scandens, whose pungent leaves and roots are used as a remedy for toothache.
| 1760 J. Lee Introd. Bot. App. 330 Tooth-wort, Plumbago. 1884 Miller Plant-n., Plumbago scandens, Devil's-herb, or Tooth-wort, of the W. Indies. |