papaw
noun
Also a form of pawpaw
Forms papaws
- noun Alternative form of pawpaw.
Synonyms
Etymology
Via Portuguese and Spanish papaya from Lokono papáia; compare also Kari'na kapaja.
Related to papa, or pa(w) pa(w) (one’s father’s father).
Webster’s 1913
- noun A tree (Carica Papaya) of tropical America, belonging to the order Passifloreæ. It has a soft, spongy stem, eighteen or twenty feet high, crowned with a tuft of large, long-stalked, palmately lobed leaves. The milky juice of the plant is said to have the property of making meat tender. Also, its dull orange-colored, melon-shaped fruit, which is eaten both raw and cooked or pickled.
- noun A tree of the genus Asimina (A. triloba), growing in the western and southern parts of the United States, and producing a sweet edible fruit; also, the fruit itself. Gray.
Etymology [Prob. from the native name in the West Indies; cf. Sp. papayo papaw, papaya the fruit of the papaw.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “papaw”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details