silk-cotton tree

[silk-kot-n]

noun

1. any of several spiny trees belonging to the genus Ceiba, of the bombax family, having palmately compound leaves and seeds surrounded by silk cotton, especially C. pentandra, from which kapok is obtained.

silk-cotton tree

noun

1. Also called: kapok tree. any of several tropical bombacaceous trees of the genus Ceiba, esp Ceiba pentandra, having seeds covered with silky hairs from which kapok is obtained

Word History and Origins

Origin of silk-cotton tree¹

First recorded in 1705–15

Example Sentences

I visited Montserrat for the St. Patrick’s Festival this year; it began with a torch lighting at the silk-cotton tree at Cudjoe Head—a village named after the man who led the 1768 uprising.

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Kapok, ka-pok′, n. a cottony or silky fibre covering the seeds of a species of silk-cotton tree, used for stuffing pillows, &c.

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The ceiba, or silk-cotton tree, at whose base I find in Africa so many votive offerings of fetich worship, they found flourishing on Jamaica.

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I was much surprised to notice the rapidity with which the silk-cotton tree burst into leaf.

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With no possibility of communicating with the others, he felt his way to a hollow silk-cotton tree, into which he crawled, and climbed upon a heap of debris that stood in the centre.

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