🧴 A skin lotion 🌳 A small tree

wych hazel

9.5

A small tree with yellow flowers whose bark is used to make a skin lotion

noun
/ˈwɪtʃ ˈheɪzl/

: hamamelis

The garden's wych hazel bloomed with yellow flowers in early spring.

Examples

I bought some wych hazels for my garden.
The wych hazel tree is known for its medicinal properties.
She applied an extract of wych hazel to soothe her irritated skin.
Some herbal remedies include wych hazel for its natural astringent properties.
She applied an extract of wych hazel to soothe her irritated skin.
Some herbal remedies include wych hazel for its natural astringent properties.
The wych hazel tree is known for its medicinal properties.

Synonyms

witch hazel

vswych hazel

1 4.9

A small tree or shrub whose bark and leaves make a skin lotion

uses only bark rather than leaves for the lotion

Hamamelis

vswych hazel

Specialized

9.8

Small trees or bushes called witch hazel that lose their leaves

refers to one shrub known for its bark used to make an astringent

Surface Forms

wych hazel singular

wych hazels plural

Morphology

wych + hazel

Although 'hazel' signals a plant, the phrase denotes a specific astringent lotion made from witch-hazel; knowing 'wych' (an elm) plus 'hazel' (a shrub) does not lead a B1 learner to infer a medicinal alcoholic extract or lotion. The sense is lexicalized, specialized, and partly historical/orthographic (wych/witch), so the overall meaning is not predictable from the constituents.

Etymology

Wych hazel is a small tree with yellow flowers whose bark and leaves were used to make a strong liquid; people made this liquid to help cuts and swelling, so the plant's name came to mean a 'skin medicine'.