wax palm

American  

noun

1. a tall, pinnate-leaved palm, Ceroxylon alpinum (orC. andicola ), of the Andes, whose stem and leaves yield a resinous wax.

2. any of several other palms that are the source of wax, as the carnauba.

---

wax palm British  

noun

1. a tall Andean palm tree, Ceroxylon andicola, having pinnate leaves that yield a resinous wax used in making candles

2. another name for carnauba

---

Etymology

Origin of wax palm

First recorded in 1820–30

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

wax palm

The soaring wax palm trees of the valley would later feature heavily onscreen.

From New York Times ● Mar. 11, 2022

And we hiked through Cocora Valley in the Zona Cafetera, where the wax palm trees stretched impossibly tall, through the mist toward the sky.

From New York Times ● Dec. 15, 2021

Not long into the film — as towering wax palm trees filled the screen — my eyes glazed with tears.

From New York Times ● Dec. 15, 2021

They take honey, manufactured wax, palm and Castilian wine, civet-cats, large tibors in which to store their tea, glass, cloth, and other curiosities from España.

From The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 — Volume 16 of 55 1609 Explorations by Early Navigators, Descriptions of the Islands and Their Peoples, Their History and Records of the Catholic Missions, as Related in Contemporaneous Books and Manuscripts, Showing the Political, Economic, Commercial and Religious Conditions of Those Islands from Their Earliest Relations with European Nations to the Close of the Nineteenth Century by Robertson, James Alexander

Ceroxylon andicola.—The wax palm of New Grenada, first described by Humboldt and Bonpland, who found it on elevated mountains, extending as high as the lower limit of perpetual snow.

From Catalogue of Economic Plants in the Collection of the U. S. Department of Agriculture by Saunders, William