Kniphofia praecox
- noun
- Specialized
:
Kniphofia praecox
- The tall spikes of Kniphofia praecox add a dramatic accent to flower borders.
Examples
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The vibrant blooms of the Kniphofia praecox attract many pollinators to summer gardens.
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Gardeners often choose Kniphofia praecox for its bold color display and easy care.
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The Kniphofia praecox blooms beautifully in summer.
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I planted Kniphofia praecox in my garden last spring.
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Gardeners often choose Kniphofia praecox for its bold color display and easy care.
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The tall spikes of Kniphofia praecox add a dramatic accent to flower borders.
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The vibrant blooms of the Kniphofia praecox attract many pollinators to summer gardens.
Synonyms
1
8.2
A tall garden plant with long spikes of bright red or orange flowers
A tall plant with red flower spikes that gardeners grow
A garden plant with long grasslike leaves and tall spikes of red or yellow drooping flowers
A tall garden plant with long grasslike leaves and red or yellow hanging flower spikes
Surface Forms
Morphology
Kniphofia + praecox
The first constituent 'Kniphofia' denotes a genus of clump-forming flowering plants, so a learner who knows that can infer this is a type of that plant; however the second element 'praecox' is a Latin species epithet (not given a dictionary gloss here) and would not be interpretable to a B1 learner without knowledge of taxonomic naming or Latin. Because the binomial signals a specific species (partly compositional) but the precise semantic contribution of 'praecox' is not transparent to typical learners, the expression is only partially predictable.
Etymology
Kniphofia praecox comes from a real person and a Latin word: Kniphofia was named for Johann Kniphof, a German doctor who loved plants, and praecox means 'early'. The name gives a clear picture of an early-blooming plant with tall, torch-like red spikes, which is why gardeners call it the 'red hot poker'.