palmetto

American  

[pal-met-oh, pahl-, pah-met-oh] / pælˈmɛt oʊ, pɑl-, pɑˈmɛt oʊ /

noun

• palmettos,
  plural
• palmettoes
  plural

1. any of various palms having fan-shaped leaves, as of the genera Sabal, Serenoa, and Thrinax.

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palmetto British  

/ pælˈmɛtəʊ /

noun

1. any of several small chiefly tropical fan palms, esp any of the genus Sabal, of the southeastern US See also cabbage palmetto saw palmetto

2. any of various other fan palms such as palms of the genera Serenoa, Thrinax, and Chamaerops

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• palmettoes
  plural
• palmettos
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of palmetto

1555–65; earlier palmito < Spanish, diminutive of palma palm ²; -etto by association with -ette

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Explanation

A palmetto is a type of palm tree. You're most likely to see palmettos in South America or the southern US states, instead of say Nebraska. A palmetto (the "cabbage palmetto, to be specific) is Florida's official state tree, and South Carolina is known as "the palmetto state." Palmettos are fan palms, with leaves in the shape of fans that are arranged in a rounded shape. The very middle of the palmetto plant is edible, and when it's harvested and sold as food, it's called "heart of palm." Palmetto comes from the Spanish palmito, "little palm tree."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

palmetto palmettoes palmettos

Herbal supplements such as saw palmetto are not currently recommended, although some men say they work for them.

From BBC ● Jan. 18, 2024

Nashville’s local palms, the dwarf palmetto and Sabal minor, might, at best, yield a fluffy lowercase m.

From Slate ● Sep. 5, 2023

Enormous palmetto bugs lived under her bed, scurrying into the open after she doused the lights.

From Seattle Times ● Apr. 3, 2023

In the middle of the 20th century, this flat peninsula was a swampy, mosquito-infested spit of mangrove and palmetto scrubland inhabited by a handful of cattle ranchers.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 6, 2022

Early that morning, Mama wove palmetto leaves into roses for us to wear at the funeral.

From "Root Magic" by Eden Royce

I could not be certain, however, as the three were well sheltered behind a clump of trees, and covered, also, by a thicket of dwarf palmettoes.

From Osceola the Seminole The Red Fawn of the Flower Land by Mayne Reid

The Indians were concealed in the palmettoes, about two hundred yards distant.

From General Scott by Marcus Joseph Wright

I crossed the little ridge among the stems of the palmettoes; it was the direct route to the shadowy side of the tank.

From Osceola the Seminole The Red Fawn of the Flower Land by Mayne Reid

They were prickt with palmettoes, and the cedar branches raspt their faces.

From How Shakspere Came to Write the Tempest by Rudyard Kipling

The camp was in a bend of the Del Norte, in a glade surrounded by tall cotton-woods, whose smooth trunks rose vertically out of a thick underwood of palmettoes and Spanish bayonet.

From The Scalp Hunters by F.A. Stewart

“Our ownly food was palmettos boiled with the meat and without salt, and the cores of palm trees” — hearts of palm, a future foodie TikTok rage.

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 20, 2025

During the day, she shapes topiary and rinses fungicide residue from palmettos so they can be passed off as organic.

From New York Times ● May 17, 2022

On a humid afternoon in June 1954, my parents married in a whitewashed Methodist church in my mother’s hometown in rural south Georgia, rosette windows and palmettos framing the front doors.

From Washington Post ● Oct. 4, 2021

Her work included a study of palmettos near her home at 71 Rutledge Ave. and possibly field research on the Isle of Palms.

From Washington Times ● Jan. 6, 2021

Stands of palmettos and live oaks met the car as the road ribboned out straight in its last sprint to the barrier islands.

From "The Great Santini" by Pat Conroy

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