ˈwater-ˌlily
The common name for many aquatic plants with large flowers, belonging to the N.O. Nymphæaceæ. In British use chiefly applied to the white water-lily, Nymphæa alba, and the yellow water-lily, Nuphar lutea. The Australian (blue) water-lily is Nymphæa gigantea.
| 1549 Compl. Scot. vi. (1872) 67, I sau the vattir lille, quhilk is ane remeid contrar gomoria. 1578 Lyte Dodoens ii. xxviii. 180 There be two kindes of water Lyllies..the yellow, and the white. 1597 Gerarde Herbal ii. cclxxxii. 672 The white water Lillie or Nenuphar, hath great round leaues, in shape of a buckler. 1652 Culpepper Eng. Phys. 120 The white Water-Lilly hath very large, round and thick dark green leaves. 1760 J. Lee Introd. Bot. App. 317 Lily, Lesser Yellow Water, with fringed Flowers, Menyanthes. 1788 Cowper (title) The Dog and the Water-Lily. 1818 Byron Ch. Har. iv. lxvii, While, chance, some scattered water-lily sails Down where the shallower wave still tells its bubbling tales. 1820 Shelley Sensit. Pl. 45 Broad water lilies lay tremulously. 1861 Tennyson in Ld. Tennyson Mem. (1897) I. 471 The Isle of Wight is like a water-lily on a blue lake. 1882 Garden 11 Nov. 421/1 There is the giant blue Water Lily of Australia. |
b. Applied to aquatic plants of other orders.
The ‘water lily’ of New Zealand is Ranunculus lyallii.
| 1653 Walton Angler ii. 40 Look down at the bottom of the hil, there in that Meadow, chequered with water Lillies and Lady-smocks. 1882 H. Friend Devonsh. Plant-n., Water Lily, Iris Pseudacorus. 1886 Cheshire Gloss., Water Lily, the arum lily, Calla palustris. 1893 Wiltshire Gloss., Water-lily (1) Caltha palustris. (2) Ranunculus aquatitis. |