yew

From Middle English ew, from Old English īw, ēow, from Proto-Germanic *īwaz, *īhwaz (compare Icelandic ýr), masculine variant of *īwō (compare Dutch ijf, German Eibe), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁eyHweh₂ (compare Hittite [script needed] (eja, “type of evergreen”), Welsh yw (“yews”), Latgalian īva (“bird cherry”), Lithuanian ievà (“bird cherry”), Russian и́ва (íva, “willow”)).[1]

• enPR: yo͞o, IPA^(key): /juː/, /jɪʊ̯/
• Rhymes: -uː
• Homophones: ewe, u, you, hew (in h-dropping dialects), hue (in h-dropping dialects)

yew (countable and uncountable, plural yews)

1. (countable) A species of coniferous tree, Taxus baccata, with dark-green flat needle-like leaves and seeds bearing red arils, native to western, central and southern Europe, northwest Africa, northern Iran and southwest Asia.
2. (countable, by extension) Any tree or shrub of the genus Taxus.
3. Other conifers resembling plants in genus Taxus
   1. in family Podocarpaceae
   2. in family Cephalotaxaceae
4. (uncountable) The wood of the such trees.
   • 1786, Francis Grose, A Treatise on Ancient Armour and Weapons, page 37:

     To prevent a too great consumption of yew, bowyers were directed to make four bows of witch-hazel, ash or elm, to one of yew, and no person under seventeen years of age, unless possessed of moveables worth forty marks, of the son of parents having an estate of ten pounds per annum might shoot in an yew bow, under a penalty of 6s. 8d.

5. A bow for archery, made of yew wood.

• (Taxus baccata): English yew, European yew, common yew

yew (not comparable)

1. Made from the wood of the yew tree.

• Taxus baccata on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

• Wey, Wye, wey, wye

yew

1. Alternative form of yow

• “you, (pron.)” in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 18 May 2018.

yew (plural yêw)

1. house

• R. Blench, Beboid Comparative

From Proto-Indo-Iranian *Haywas.

yew

1. one