▪ I. prunella1
(pruːˈnɛlə)
Also 7–9 prunello; β. 8 prenel, 9 prunelle.
[Of uncertain history: identical with mod.F. prunelle, but this is cited by Littré only from 1780, though it may occur earlier. Littré derives the name from prunelle, sloe, in reference to its dark colour. The forms prunella, -ello have the appearance of It. or Sp., but do not occur in dicts. of these langs. in the 17th c.; they may have been merely Eng. grandiose alterations, as in some words in -ada, -ado, etc. The β form prunelle follows the French.]
1. A strong stuff, orig. silk, afterwards worsted, formerly used for graduates', clergymen's, and barristers' gowns; later, for the uppers of women's shoes.
leather and prunella: a misquotation and misapplication of Pope's ‘leather or prunella’: see leather n. 1 d.
| 1656 Bk. Values in Scobell Acts & Ordin. Parl. (1658) 474 Wrought Silks called..Prunellos, broad, the Ell 00. 15. 00. 1670 Lady M. Bertie in 12th Rep. Hist. MSS. Comm. App. v. 21 Upon the Queene's Birthday most wore..plaine black skirts of Morella, Mohair, Prunella, and such stuffs. 1688 R. Holme Armoury iii. 199/1 Bachelors of Art..have a full Gown..of Stuff, Silk, Prunella, or the like. 1734 Pope Ess. Man iv. 204 Worth makes the man, and want of it, the fellow; The rest is all but leather or prunella. a 1761 Cawthorn Poems, Wit & Learning (1771) 191 He..Gave him a robe of sleek prunella. 1811–1879 [see leather n. 1 d]. 1864 Sala Quite Alone I. i. 2 Everybody..trips in soft sandalled prunella, or white satin with high heels. 1882 Beck Draper's Dict., Prunella, Prunello, a stuff only rescued from complete oblivion by Pope's famous couplet. |
| β 1710 Lond. Gaz. No. 4706/4 For Sale.., black Prenels and Russerines. 1840 J. P. Kennedy Quodlibet ix, Agamemnon Flag..in boots of drab prunelle. 1857 James Hist. Worsted Manuf. x. 362 There were different sorts of lastings, as prunelles wrought with three healds. |
2. (See quot. A modern trade use.)
| 1904 Woollen Draper's Terms in Tailor & Cutter 4 Aug. 479/3 Prunella, a superior make of doeskin having a fine diagonal twill on it. |
3. attrib. Made or consisting of prunella.
| 1706 E. Ward Wooden World Diss. (1708) 41 He wears his Prunella Gown, as chearily as he does his Honesty. 1862 Russell Diary North & South (1863) II. 20 White jean trousers, strapped under a pair of prunella slippers. 1872–6 Voyle & Stevenson Milit. Dict., Lasting Cloth, a material similar to prunella cloth. 1907 in Daily News 2 Oct. 4, I brushed her [Marie Antoinette's] pretty black prunella shoes. |
Hence pruˈnella'd a., wearing prunella gowns.
| 1812 H. & J. Smith Rej. Addr. xv, Nods the prunella'd bar, attorneys smile. |
▪ II. ‖ pruˈnella2 Bot.
[Bot. L., alteration of Brunella, generic name in Tournefort and Linnæus, recently restored in English Floras. P. vulgaris is said to have been so named from being a specific against the disease brunella or prunella: see brunel, prunel, and Note to next.]
A genus of herbaceous labiates, of general distribution in both temperate zones. P. vulgaris, Self-heal, is a common weed in Britain. (Formerly also taken to include the Bugle, Ajuga reptans.)
| [1578 Lyte Dodoens i. xc. 133 The second kinde is also called Consolida media, but most commonly Prunella or Brunella: in English Prunell.] 1599 A. M. tr. Gabelhouer's Bk. Physicke 74/2 This vngvent is also excellent..for sore throtes, when as we intermixe the same with water of Prunella. 1664 Evelyn Kal. Hort. (1729) 205 May... Flowers in Prime,..Pansis, Prunella, purple Thalictrum. 1706 Phillips (ed. Kersey), Prunella..also the Herb Self-heal, good against a Quinsy, and other Diseases of the Mouth and Jaws. 1844 Emerson Ess. Ser. ii. vi. 158 All over the wide fields of earth grows the prunella or self-heal. |
▪ III. ‖ pruˈnella3 Obs.
Also 9 prunelle.
[mod.L., earlier brunella, according to 16th c. writers, orig. the L. name of an infectious epidemic called in Ger. die bräune or breune (Grimm), in Du. de bruyne, lit. ‘the browns’ or ‘brownness’, in which the tongue was covered with a brown crust. Brunella was thus a dim. of med.L. brūnus brown: cf. jaundice, F. jaunisse, and such names of diseases as whites, yellows, blues, etc. The corruption prunella may have been due to High German pronunciation, or to a later fancied etymology, taking it as dim. of L. prūna ‘burning coal’. See also brunel, prunel, prunella2, name of the herb reputed as a specific for the disease; and Note below.]
1. Path. A name given to the Hungarian or camp-fever which prevailed among the imperial troops in Germany in 1547 and 1566, considered by Hecker to have been petechial. In later times, applied to other disorders of the throat or fauces, esp. to quinsy: see quots. In quot. 1658 app. used for Inflammation.
| 1658 A. Fox Würtz' Surg. i. v. 20 Many use Phlebotomy..supposing to prevent hereby the prunella in wounds. 1669 W. Simpson Hydrol. Chym. 83 The spaw water avails nothing in..plurisies, prunella's, poysons. 1693 tr. Blancard's Phys. Dict. (ed. 2), Prunella, is sometimes taken for Apthæ, White, Black or Red, sometimes for a Quinsie or the Hungarick Fever. 1895 Syd. Soc. Lex., Prunella{ddd}term for Angina pectoris; also, for Cynanche; also, for thrush, Aphthous stomatitis. |
2. Pharmacy. Chielfy in comb. prunella salt, prunelle salt, in mod.L. sal prunellæ, prunellæ sal, also lapis prunellæ ‘prunella stone’, sal-prunella, name for a preparation of fused nitre.
So called as used for the disorder of the throat.
| 1627 Pharmacop. Lond. (ed. 3) 189 Lapis Prunellæ. 1669 tr. Schroder's Dispensatory 254 Lapis Prunellæ, Nitre tabulated or prepared. 1681 [see sal-prunella]. 1706 Phillips (ed. Kersey), Sal Prunellæ..is sometimes called Lapis Prunellæ, and Crystal Mineral; being usually given to cool and provoke Urine in Feavers and Quinsies. 1741 Compl. Fam.-Piece i. ii. 103 Put to it 4 Pounds of Bay Salt,..2 Ounces of Prunella Salt. 1830 Maunder Dict., Prunella, purified saltpetre. 1864 Webster s.v., Prunella salt, or prunella, fused niter, molded into cakes or balls, and used for chemical purposes. 1866–8 Watts Dict. Chem. IV. 740 Prunelle Salt or Nitrum tabulatum, fused saltpetre. |
[Note. For the etymology of brunella, and the derivation thence of the name of the herb, cf. quots. under brunel, prunel, and prunella2, also Gerarde Herbal (1636) 508.
As to the camp-fever of 1547, 1566, see Hecker Epidemics of the Middle Ages, Eng. tr. by Babington, ed. 3, 1859, 277–8. Grimm cites Kirchhof (1602) Milit. Discipl. 202 ‘viel seucht und krankheiten (im lager), sonderlich die breune’. Kilian (1599) has ‘Bruyne..oris vitium cum linguæ tumore, exasperatione, siccitate, & nigredine: vnde et nomen teutonicè habet, vulgo brunella: quo nomine et herba vocatur quæ huic morbo medetur’. As to sal prunellæ, Boerhaave, Elem. Chemiæ (1732) 389, says (tr. P. Shaw 1741 II. 245), This has obtained the name of sal prunellæ from the Germans, who observing that a certain kind of epidemical camp-fever, attended with a dangerous black quinsey, which they call die braune, was happily cured by the use of this powder; they thence called it by that name: and for the same reason they give the same appellation to the plant self-heal or prunella, because this cures the same distemper.]
▪ IV. prunella
variant of prunello.