palm nut
- noun
- /pɑlm nʌt/
- Specialized
:
nuez de palma
- Sword ornaments with palm nuts are found in the treasuries of a number of states, including the regalia of the Asantehene and the states of Edweso, Kumawu, and Akyem Oda.
Examples
-
The amorphous shapes above the climber's head suggest clusters of oil palm nuts.
Academic text (1998) -
And when he planted his palm nuts, vegetation sprung up on all the earth.
Fiction book (1994) -
So I sat near him and on the ground was a ripe red palm nut, which chimps love, the fruit of the oil nut palm.
-
At Edweso, the ornament actually depicts a hand on the prickly bunch of palm nuts.
Academic text (2003) -
From Kumawu comes the sword ornament representing a bunch of palm nuts, sometimes referred to as a palm fruit (Fig. 25).
Academic text (2003) -
How he hooked a gold chain onto the edge of the sky and descended to the water below, carrying with him a snail's shell filled with sand, a pouch of palm nuts, and the egg which contained the essence of all the orishas.
Fiction book (1994) -
Stone implements are a daily feature of life for many chimpanzees, such as this adult female (at right) using a hammer-and-anvil to crack oil-palm nuts at Bassa Island, Liberia.
Academic text (1999) -
Capuchin monkeys use rocks to crack open palm nuts for food.
-
Workers collect palm nuts from the oil palm trees during the harvest season.
-
The rich oil is extracted from palm nuts, which are an important agricultural product.
Synonyms
A seed of the oil palm that people press to make cooking oil
A hard-shelled palm nut that gives oil and has an inside you can eat
A large nut from a palm that gives oil and has a hard shell carved like ivory
An edible nut from palm trees that grow in Brazil or the Caribbean
A hard white seed from a South American palm used to make buttons and small objects
A hard white seed from a South American palm tree that people polish to make buttons
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'seed of an oil palm' is directly and compositionally derived from 'palm' (the tree) + 'nut' (a seed), so a learner who knows both words can infer this referent. This noun–noun compounding is a standard, cross-linguistic naming pattern and therefore immediately comprehensible to B1 learners.
Etymology
Palm nut is a literal name: it is the hard seed from a palm tree, the nut people crack to get oil and flesh. So, the word today means that seed used to make 'palm oil' and to eat.
