squill

American  

[skwil] / skwɪl /

noun

1. the bulb of the sea onion, Urginea maritima, of the lily family, cut into thin slices and dried, and used in medicine chiefly as an expectorant.

2. the plant itself.

3. any related plant of the genus Scilla.

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squill British  

/ skwɪl /

noun

1. See sea squill

2. the bulb of the sea squill, formerly used medicinally as an expectorant after being sliced and dried

3. any Old World liliaceous plant of the genus Scilla , such as S. verna ( spring squill ) of Europe, having small blue or purple flowers

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Other Word Forms

• squill-like
  adjective

Etymology

Origin of squill

1350–1400; Middle English < Latin squilla, variant of scilla < Greek skílla

Example Sentences

There's similarly little evidence that plant extracts, like thyme and squill, have any impact.

From BBC • Dec. 3, 2025

On Instagram, friends share colorful, exuberant, almost psychedelic pictures of turmeric-orange poppies in Berkeley, Calif., of cotton-candy ornamental cherry trees in Portland, Ore., of bluish-purple Siberian squill in upstate New York.

From New York Times • Apr. 24, 2020

This will ask them to find a list of potion-worthy species, like squill, cinnamon, ginger and monkshood, in the conservatory, where an alchemy table will also offer demonstrations of plant-based chemistry.

From New York Times • Dec. 6, 2018

Probably the oldest of rat poisons is about the most effective and also the safest: red squill, from the ground root of a European plant.

From Time Magazine Archive

Violent cathartics, emetic tartar, squill, buckthorn, rhamnus catharticus, scammonium, convolvulus scammonia, gamboge, elaterium, colocynth, cucumis colocynthis, veratrum.

From Zoonomia, Vol. II Or, the Laws of Organic Life by Darwin, Erasmus