Wiktionary

prune

English edit

 
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Alternative forms edit

Pronunciation edit

Etymology 1 edit

From Middle English prune, from Old French prune, from Vulgar Latin *prūna, feminine singular formed from the neutral plural of Latin prūnum, from Ancient Greek προῦνον (proûnon), variant of προῦμνον (proûmnon, “plum”), a loanword from a language of Asia Minor. Doublet of plum.

Noun edit

prune (plural prunes)

  1. (obsolete) A plum.
  2. The dried, wrinkled fruit of certain species of plum.
    Hyponym: alubukhara
  3. (figurative) Something wrinkly like a prune.
    • 1970, Dana Densmore, “Without You And Within You”, in No More Fun & Games, volume 4, page 55:
      We are not free when we are in the grip of the false conditioning that decrees that we need sex. We are not free if we believe the culture's ominous warnings that we will become "horny" (what a callous, offensive word) and frustrated and neurotic and finally shrivel up into prunes and have to abandon hope of being good, creative, effective people.
  4. (slang) An old woman, especially a wrinkly one.

Verb edit

prune (third-person singular simple present prunes, present participle pruning, simple past and past participle pruned)

  1. (intransitive, informal) To become wrinkled like a dried plum, as the fingers and toes do when kept submerged in water.
    • 2005, Alycia Ripley, Traveling with an Eggplant, page 111:
      I hardly left that spot in my pool that month even when my fingers pruned and chlorine dried out my skin.
Synonyms edit
Hypernyms edit
Derived terms edit
Translations edit
plum — see plum

Etymology 2 edit

From Middle English prunen, prounen, proinen, from Old French proignier (“to trim the feathers with the beak”), earlier prooignier, ultimately from Latin pro- ("front") + rotundus (“round”) 'to round-off the front'.

Verb edit

prune (third-person singular simple present prunes, present participle pruning, simple past and past participle pruned)

  1. (transitive, horticulture) To remove excess material from a tree or shrub; to trim, especially to make more healthy or productive.
    A good grape grower will prune the vines once a year.
  2. (transitive, figuratively) To cut down or shorten (by the removal of unnecessary material).
    to prune a budget, or an essay
  3. (transitive) To remove (something unnecessary) for the sake of cutting down or shortening that which it was previously part of.
    • 1990, Wayne Jancik, The Billboard Book of One-Hit Wonders, →ISBN, page 229:
      When internal dissension and a decline in popularity set in, Johnny was pruned from the Crests.
  4. (transitive, computer science) To remove unnecessary branches from a tree data structure.
  5. (obsolete) To preen; to prepare; to dress.
Derived terms edit
Translations edit

Anagrams edit

French edit

 
French Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia fr

Etymology edit

Inherited from Old French prune, from Vulgar Latin *prūna, feminine singular formed from the neutral plural of Latin prūnum, from Ancient Greek προῦμνον (proûmnon).

Pronunciation edit

Noun edit

prune f (plural prunes)

  1. plum
  2. (slang) ticket (“traffic citation”)

Derived terms edit

Further reading edit

Latin edit

Noun edit

prūne

  1. vocative singular of prūnus

Middle English edit

Alternative forms edit

Etymology edit

Borrowed from Old French prune, from Vulgar Latin *prūna, from Latin prūnum, from Ancient Greek προῦνον (proûnon), προῦμνον (proûmnon). Doublet of plomme.

Pronunciation edit

Noun edit

prune (plural prunes)

  1. A plum (fruit of Prunus domestica)
  2. A prune (dried plum)
  3. (pathology) A large, rounded boil.

Descendants edit

  • English: prune

References edit

Old French edit

Etymology edit

From Vulgar Latin *prūna, feminine singular formed from the neutral plural of Latin prūnum.

Noun edit

prune oblique singular, f (oblique plural prunes, nominative singular prune, nominative plural prunes)

  1. plum (fruit)

Descendants edit

Romanian edit

Pronunciation edit

Noun edit

prune

  1. plural of prună
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