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California nutmeg

American  

noun

  1. a tall, pungently aromatic California evergreen tree, Torreya californica, of the yew family, having a fissured, gray-brown bark and small, purple-streaked, green fruit.

Etymology

Origin of California nutmeg

An Americanism dating back to 1905–10

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

It is the tree locally known under the name of the California nutmeg.

From Project Gutenberg

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.