Skip to main content
Glite Dictionary
📖 A herbal book 🌿 A herb garden
herbary

herbary

9.9
A book that describes plants used for medicine
  • noun
  • /ˈhɜːrbəri/
  • Archaic
translation icon : herbario
  • In the library, I discovered a rare herbary that detailed the healing properties of various herbs.

Examples

  • She often referred to her grandmother's herbary to find remedies for common ailments.

  • The ancient manuscript included an extensive herbary that cataloged plants used in traditional medicine.

  • Rog's meek, pallid wife fussed over her and sent bondmaids hastening to and from the herbary with medicinal draughts and balms.

    Fiction book (1993)

Synonyms

herbal
vsherbary
  • Archaic
5 4.7

A book that describes plants and their uses for medicine

focuses specifically on herbs rather than plants generally

Surface Forms

herbary singular
herbaries plural

Morphology

herbary = herb (semi-transparent) = herb + ary

The formation 'herb' + '-ary' is visible, but the specialised sense 'a book describing herbs' is a historical/specific usage learners may not infer from the base alone.

Etymology

Herbary comes from Latin herba 'herb' and an ending that means 'a place for', like in library. So a herbary can be a book that is like a 'library of herbs', a collection of information about plants and their uses, which explains the meaning 'a book about herbs'.