Indian tobacco

American  

noun

1. a common American plant, Lobelia inflata, of the lobelia family, having small, blue flowers and inflated capsules.

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Indian tobacco British  

noun

1. a poisonous North American campanulaceous plant, Lobelia inflata, with small pale blue flowers and rounded inflated seed capsules

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Etymology

Origin of Indian tobacco

First recorded in 1610–20

Example Sentences

Essentra FZE from about 2013 to 2019 was a subsidiary of a partnership begun in 2013 in Dubai with an Indian tobacco company identified only as “Company 1” in court filings.

From Washington Post • Jul. 16, 2020

In the 1990s, she began working with lobeline, a compound derived from a group of plants, including Lobelia inflata, commonly known as Indian tobacco.

From Nature • Jun. 23, 2015

Sir James: In regard to the constitution of the cigarets, I understand that the material to which my honorable friend refers may, in fact, be Indian tobacco.

From Time Magazine Archive

The Virginia tobacco in early times was imported into England in the leaf, in bundles; the Spanish or West Indian tobacco in balls.

From The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 11 by Johnson, Rossiter

This plant was the Indian tobacco, and it is from the beaver that the Blackfeet got it.

From Blackfoot Lodge Tales The Story of a Prairie People by Grinnell, George Bird