mulberry

Mulberry definition

Heb. bakah, "to weep;" rendered "Baca" (R.V., "weeping") in Ps. 84:6. The plural form of the Hebrew bekaim is rendered "mulberry trees" in 2 Sam. 5:23, 24 and 1 Chr. 14:14, 15. The tree here alluded to was probably the aspen or trembling poplar. "We know with certainty that the black poplar, the aspen, and the Lombardy poplar grew in Palestine. The aspen, whose long leaf-stalks cause the leaves to tremble with every breath of wind, unites with the willow and the oak to overshadow the watercourses of the Lebanon, and with the oleander and the acacia to adorn the ravines of Southern Palestine" (Kitto). By "the sound of a going in the tops of the mulberry trees" we are to understand a rustling among the trees like the marching of an army. This was the signal that the Lord himself would lead forth David's army to victory. (See SYCAMINE.)

mulberry

any of several distinct small to medium-sized trees valued primarily for their ornamental effects. The common mulberries, in the genus Morus (family Moraceae), are 10 species, with more or less juicy fruits, native to temperate Asia and North America. Paper mulberry (Broussonetia papyrifera), of the same family, has red globular fruit and an inner bark that yields a fibre used in the Orient for papermaking and in Polynesia for the manufacture of a coarse fabric called tapa cloth. It is a tough, fast-growing tree that tolerates city conditions; it is available in several varieties (cut-leaved, white-fruited, and variegated) that find use as hardy ornamentals and in naturalized landscapes. It may also be grown in pots or in conservatories and succeeds best in a rich, deep, and somewhat moist loam. The beautyberry (Callicarpa americana), with showy violet fruits, is also called French mulberry; it is a 2-metre- (6-foot-) tall shrub in the verbena family (Verbenaceae).

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