confederate jasmine
- noun
:
jazmín confederado
- She admired how the Confederate jasmine climbed the trellis, adding beauty to the backyard.
Examples
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Someone nearby had planted Confederate jasmine; the sweet, tender smell almost took my breath.
Fiction book (1998) -
Confederate jasmine is often used in gardens for its fragrant white flowers and lush green leaves.
-
In spring, the delightful scent of Confederate jasmine fills the air around the garden.
Synonyms
A climbing evergreen vine with shiny dark green leaves and white, very fragrant star-shaped flowers often called star jasmine
A climbing evergreen plant with shiny dark green leaves and white star-shaped flowers that smell sweet
Surface Forms
Morphology
The constituent 'jasmine' clearly signals a plant, so learners will likely infer this is a kind or variety of jasmine; however 'confederate' does not transparently describe botanical features and here functions as a lexicalized or regional name. A B1 learner who knows both words can guess it is a type of jasmine but cannot derive the specific properties (evergreen, climbing, native origin, fragrance) from the parts alone.
Etymology
Confederate jasmine may get its name from how often it was planted across the American South, where people saw it on porches and fences and linked it to the 'confederate' states. Its sweet white flowers and the way jasmine climbs made it a common garden plant, so the name stuck and today confederate jasmine means this fragrant climbing plant.
