vegetable ivory


Origin of vegetable ivory

1
First recorded in 1835–45

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use vegetable ivory in a sentence

  • The forests yield cinchona bark, caoutchouc, sarsaparilla, and vegetable ivory.

  • Substitution of vegetable ivory for metal in buttons was attempted.

  • Among those products of the palm which we import most liberally is "vegetable ivory."

    Miscellanea | Juliana Horatia Ewing
  • vegetable ivory is the kernel of the fruit of one of the most beautiful of palms (Phytelephas macrocarpa).

    Miscellanea | Juliana Horatia Ewing
  • The roofs are of thatch, for which the leaves of the yarina or vegetable-ivory tree are generally used.

British Dictionary definitions for vegetable ivory

vegetable ivory

noun
  1. the hard whitish material obtained from the endosperm of the ivory nut: used to make buttons, ornaments, etc

  2. another name for the ivory nut

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012