taro
(ˈtɑːrəʊ, ˈtærəʊ)
Also 8 tarrow, 9 tara, tarro.
[Native Polynesian name, found by Cook in the Sandwich Islands.]
a. A food-plant, Colocasia antiquorum, N.O. Araceæ, cultivated in many varieties (C. esculenta, macrorhiza, etc.) in most tropical countries for its starchy root-stocks, or its succulent leaves or stems, which in a raw state are acrid, but lose their acridity by boiling.
| 1769 S. Parkinson Jrnl. 1 Oct. in Jrnl. Voy. South Seas (1773) ii. 97 Adjoining to their houses are plantations of Koomarra and Taro. 1779 Cook Voy. Pacific (1784) III. v. iv. 79 Each man carrying..bread-fruit, taro, and plantains in his hand. Ibid. vi. 106 These plantations consist of the tarrow or eddy root, and the sweet potatoe [etc.]. 1802 Brookes' Gazetteer (ed. 12) s.v. Ranai, It produces very few plantains and bread⁓fruit trees, but abounds in yams, sweet potatoes, and taro. 1894 Dublin Rev. Oct. 460 Yams and taros are cultivated. |
b. attrib., as taro-patch, taro-plain, taro-plant, taro-plantation, taro-root, taro-swamp.
| 1814 W. Brown Hist. Propag. Chr. among Heathen II. 400 A large piece of ground stocked with breadfruit, cocoa nuts, and tarro roots. 1846 Lundie Mission. Life Samoa xxii. 141 All are busy building houses and clearing for taro-patches. 1847 Whittier Dan. Wheeler 79 Amidst Owyhee's hills of blue And taro-plains of Tooboonai. 1894 Daily News 11 Sept. 6/1 Streams of water..fertilising thousands of taro plantations. 1894 B. Thomson S. Sea Yarns 111 The taro swamp was hard and fissured. |