tree

noun

a plant having a permanently woody main stem or trunk, ordinarily growing to a considerable height, and usually developing branches at some distance from the ground.

any of various shrubs, bushes, and plants, as the banana, resembling a tree in form and size.

something resembling a tree in shape, as a clothes tree or a crosstree.

Mathematics, Linguistics, tree diagram.

family tree.

a pole, post, beam, bar, handle, or the like, as one forming part of some structure.

a shoetree or boot tree.

a saddletree.

a treelike group of crystals, as one forming in an electrolytic cell.

10.

a gallows or gibbet.

11.

the cross on which Christ was crucified.

12.

Computers. a data structure organized like a tree whose nodes store data elements and whose branches represent pointers to other nodes in the tree.

13.

Relevant Questions

verb (used with object)

14.

to drive into or up a tree, as a pursued animal or person.

15.

Informal. to put into a difficult position.

16.

to stretch or shape on a tree, as a boot.

17.

to furnish (a structure) with a tree.

00:10

Tree is one of our favorite verbs.

So is absquatulate. Does it mean:

to flee; abscond:

to introduce subtleties into or argue subtly about.

LEARN MORE FUN, UNUSUAL VERBS WITH WORD DYNAMO...

Idioms

18.

up a tree, Informal. in a difficult or embarrassing situation; at a loss; stumped.

Origin:
before 900; Middle English; Old English trēo(w); cognate with Old Frisian, Old Norse trē, Old Saxon treo, Gothic triu; akin to Greek drŷs oak, Sanskrit, Avestan dru wood

Related forms

tree·like, adjective

Dictionary.com Unabridged

noun

Sir Herbert Beer·bohm

[beer-bohm] , ( Herbert Beerbohm ) 1853–1917, English actor and theater manager; brother of Max Beerbohm.

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2013.
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Link To Tree

Collins

World English Dictionary

tree (triː)

—n
1.	any large woody perennial plant with a distinct trunk giving rise to branches or leaves at some distance from the groundRelated: arboreal
2.	any plant that resembles this but has a trunk not made of wood, such as a palm tree
3.	a wooden post, bar, etc
4.	family tree shoetree See saddletree
5.	chem a treelike crystal growth; dendrite
6.	a. a branching diagrammatic representation of something, such as the grammatical structure of a sentence
	b. (as modifier): a tree diagram
7.	an archaic word for gallows
8.	archaic the cross on which Christ was crucified
9.	at the top of the tree in the highest position of a profession, etc
10.	informal (US), (Canadian) up a tree in a difficult situation; trapped or stumped

—vb , trees, treeing, treed
11.	to drive or force up a tree
12.	to shape or stretch (a shoe) on a shoetree

Related: arboreal

[Old English trēo; related to Old Frisian, Old Norse trē, Old Saxon trio, Gothic triu, Greek doru wood, drus tree]

'treeless

—*adj*

'treelessness

—n

'treelike

—*adj*

Tree (triː)

—n
	Sir Herbert Beerbohm. 1853--1917, English actor and theatre manager; half-brother of Sir Max Beerbohm. He was noted for his lavish productions of Shakespeare

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
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Etymonline

Word Origin & History

tree

O.E. treo, treow "tree" (also "wood"), from P.Gmc. *trewan (cf. O.Fris. tre, O.S. trio, O.N. tre, Goth. triu), from PIE *deru-/*doru- "oak" (cf. Skt. dru "tree, wood," daru "wood, log;" Gk. drys "oak," doru "spear;" O.C.S. drievo "tree, wood;" Serb. drvo "tree," drva "wood;" Rus. drevo "tree, wood;"

Czech drva; Pol. drwa "wood;" Lith. derva "pine wood;" O.Ir. daur, Welsh derwen "oak," Albanian drusk "oak"). Importance of the oak in mythology is reflected in the recurring use of words for "oak" to mean "tree." In O.E. and M.E., also "thing made of wood," especially the cross of the Crucifixion and a gallows (cf. Tyburn tree, gallows mentioned 12c. at Tyburn, at junction of Oxford Street and Edgware Road, place of public execution for Middlesex until 1783). Sense in family tree first attested 1706; verb meaning "to chase up a tree" is from 1700. Tree-hugger, contemptuous for "environmentalist" is attested by 1989.

"Minc'd Pyes do not grow upon every tree,
But search the Ovens for them, and there they be."
["Poor Robin," Almanack, 1669]

Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
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American Heritage

Science Dictionary

tree

(trē) Pronunciation Key
Any of a wide variety of perennial plants typically having a single woody stem, and usually branches and leaves. Many species of both gymnosperms (notably the conifers) and angiosperms grow in the form of trees. The ancient forests of the Devonian, Mississippian, and Pennsylvanian periods of the Paleozoic Era were dominated by trees belonging to groups of seedless plants such as the lycophytes. The strength and height of trees are made possible by the supportive conductive tissue known as vascular tissue.

The American Heritage® Science Dictionary
Copyright © 2002. Published by Houghton Mifflin. All rights reserved.
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Slang Dictionary

tree definition

n.
marijuana. : Grass, tree, bush. It's all pot!

Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
Cite This Source

FOLDOC

Computing Dictionary

tree definition

mathematics, data
A directed acyclic graph; i.e. a graph wherein there is only one route between any pair of nodes, and there is a notion of "toward top of the tree" (i.e. the root node), and its opposite direction, toward the leaves. A tree with n nodes has n-1 edges.
Although maybe not part of the widest definition of a tree, a common constraint is that no node can have more than one parent. Moreover, for some applications, it is necessary to consider a node's daughter nodes to be an ordered list, instead of merely a set.
As a data structure in computer programs, trees are used in everything from B-trees in databases and file systems, to game trees in game theory, to syntax trees in a human or computer languages.
(1998-11-12)

American Heritage

Idioms & Phrases

tree

see bark up the wrong tree; can't see the forest for the trees; talk someone's arm off (the bark off a tree); up a tree.