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Glite Dictionary
wild parsley

wild parsley

5.8
A plant that grows wild with leaves like parsley or carrot
  • noun
  • /waɪld ˈpɑːrsli/
translation icon : perejil silvestre
  • The chef foraged for fresh ingredients and found some wild parsley growing along the trail.

Examples

  • We spotted wild parsley while hiking in the forest, its vibrant green leaves reminding us of cultivated herbs.

  • The herbalist used wild parsley in her remedies, as its leaves have a flavor similar to common parsley.

  • Does that look like wild parsley to you?

    Life of Crime (2013)

Surface Forms

wild parsley singular
wild parsleys plural

Morphology

wild + parsley

The meaning 'uncultivated parsley-like plants' is directly and compositionally derived from 'wild' (growing naturally, not cultivated) + 'parsley' (the herb). This adjective+noun pattern is literal and cross-linguistically common, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents would readily infer the MWE meaning.

Etymology

Wild parsley comes from people noticing a plant that grew wild and looked like garden parsley. So today the name means any plant not grown in gardens that looks like parsley, and some kinds can be 'toxic'.