beech

American  

[beech] / bitʃ /

noun

• beeches
  plural

1. any deciduous tree of the genus Fagus, of temperate regions, having a smooth gray bark and bearing small, edible, triangular nuts.

2. Also called beechwood.  the wood from a beech tree of the genus Fagus, including the commonly cultivated European beech.

3. any member of the beech family (Fagaceae).

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beech British  

/ biːtʃ /

noun

1. any N temperate tree of the genus Fagus , esp F. sylvatica of Europe, having smooth greyish bark: family Fagaceae

2. any tree of the related genus Nothofagus , of temperate Australasia and South America

3. the hard wood of any of these trees, used in making furniture, etc

4. See copper beech

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• beechen
  adjective
• beechy
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• beeches
  plural

Etymology

Origin of beech

First recorded before 900; Middle English beche, Old English bēce, bōce, from Proto-Germanic bōkjōn-; akin to Old Saxon, Middle Low German boke, Dutch beuk, Old High German buohha ( German Buche ), Old Norse bōk, Latin fāgus “beech,” Doric Greek phāgós “oak,” Albanian bung “oak” (apparently not akin to book )

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

beech beeches

Ancient oak and beech trees, rare heathland and even wetland have been devastated by the recent fire that swept through the New Forest, a survey has found.

From BBC ● Aug. 21, 2026

Small amounts of fir and beech were also present.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 21, 2026

It is April, my favorite month in the corner of South West England where I live, when the beech woods explode with wild bluebells and the star-headed flowers of wild garlic ripple in the breeze.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 11, 2026

Introduced species are wreaking havoc due to similar lack of evolved defenses in the American beech, many amphibian species and North American bats of different kinds.

From Salon ● Jun. 15, 2025

She rapped again, louder, mindless of who might see her under the gray beech tree just around the corner from home.

From "Song of Solomon" by Toni Morrison

Multiple trees, including three of the famous Dark Hedges beeches, were damaged in the storm leaving some roads impassable.

From BBC ● Jan. 23, 2024

Here’s what we do know, as researchers at Carnegie Museum of Natural History laid out in a paper published earlier this year: The most common deciduous offenders are oaks and beeches.

From Slate ● Dec. 5, 2023

The poorly understood malady, called beech leaf disease, is spreading rapidly and killing both mature American beeches and saplings, new research shows.

From Science Magazine ● Nov. 10, 2021

The violinist Lady Jess played a wistful improvisation as we walked past her, through a tunnel formed by weeping beeches.

From New York Times ● Oct. 23, 2020

In Piatra Neamt and the surrounding towns, many of the shuls had been built with age-darkened wood from the firs and beeches that populated the Carpathians.

From "The City Beautiful" by Aden Polydoros