wild emmer
- noun
:
emmer silvestre
- A wheat cousin called wild emmer has resistance genes that might be moved into domesticated wheat.
Examples
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Farmers are researching wild emmer to improve modern wheat crops.
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Many researchers believe that wild emmer could help increase the yield of cultivated wheat.
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The ancient grain, wild emmer, was discovered in archaeological sites across the Middle East.
Synonyms
A wild wheat from the Middle East that is the ancestor of farmed wheat
A plant that grows naturally without farming and is the ancestor of wheat grown on farms
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'a non-domesticated form of emmer wheat' is directly and compositionally derived from 'wild' (not domesticated) + 'emmer' (a type of wheat). This adjective+noun formation follows a common and cross-linguistically familiar pattern, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents would readily infer the MWE's meaning.
Etymology
Wild emmer is the wild form of the old wheat called emmer, with wild meaning it grew in nature and emmer the ancient grain. People gathered and planted it thousands of years ago, so it became the 'ancestor' of the wheat we grow today.
