cabbage tree

American  

noun

1. any tropical tree or treelike plant having leaves or edible shoots suggestive of cabbage.

2. an Australian palm tree of the genus Livistona, especially L. australis.

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cabbage tree British  

noun

1. Also called: ti.  a tree, Cordyline australis, of New Zealand having a tall branchless trunk and a palmlike top

2. any of several other similar trees of the genus Cordyline

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Etymology

Origin of cabbage tree

First recorded in 1715–25

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

cabbage tree

As the helicopter darted through a small hole in the low-lying clouds, we were greeted by a riot of green, the dense beech forests punctuated with lighter-colored cabbage tree palms.

From Washington Post ● Jan. 8, 2015

There is a cabbage tree next to his house.

From Time Magazine Archive

Ball, though an inestimable acquisition to our colony, produces little else than the mountain cabbage tree.

From A Narrative of the Expedition to Botany-Bay by Tench, Watkin

On reaching an isolated cabbage tree one deliberately lay down, while the other backed against the tree and stood sulkily at bay.

From Five Years in New Zealand 1859 to 1864 by Booth, Robert B.

Here is the home of the palmetto4 or cabbage tree, the only palm in our wide country.

From The Continental Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, April, 1862 Devoted To Literature And National Policy by Various