whitethorn
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of whitethorn
1225–75; Middle English, translation of Latin alba spīna
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
To see the evidence, we’d have to slog into the whitethorn to see the future.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 28, 2025
Manzanita and mountain whitethorn — chaparral typical at lower elevations in California — take root in ashes and can dominate the forest.
From Seattle Times ● Oct. 25, 2023
But it’s important to try, he said, ticking off the reasons: Without restoration and resilience work, this piece of forest will likely convert to shrubland dominated by manzanita, whitethorn and chokecherry.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 11, 2023
After the 2007 Moonlight Fire in Plumas National Forest, dense stands of chaparral whitethorn and greenleaf manzanita grew back, rather than trees.
From Salon ● Dec. 1, 2021
George Gilbert thought of her, and wondered about her, as he rode Brown Molly in the winding Midlandshire lanes, where the brown hedge-rows were budding, and the whitethorn bursting into blossom.
From The Doctor's Wife by M. E. (Mary Elizabeth) Braddon
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
