BRACKEN

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does bracken mean? 

• BRACKEN (noun)
  The noun BRACKEN has 2 senses:

1. fern of southeastern Asia; not hardy in cold temperate regions

2. large coarse fern often several feet high; essentially weed ferns; cosmopolitan

  Familiarity information: BRACKEN used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• BRACKEN (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Fern of southeastern Asia; not hardy in cold temperate regions

Classified under:

Nouns denoting plants

Synonyms:

bracken; Pteridium esculentum

Hypernyms ("bracken" is a kind of...):

fern (any of numerous flowerless and seedless vascular plants having true roots from a rhizome and fronds that uncurl upward; reproduce by spores)

Holonyms ("bracken" is a member of...):

genus Pteridium; Pteridium (a genus of ferns belonging to the family Dennstaedtiaceae)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Large coarse fern often several feet high; essentially weed ferns; cosmopolitan

Classified under:

Nouns denoting plants

Synonyms:

bracken; brake; pasture brake; Pteridium aquilinum

Hypernyms ("bracken" is a kind of...):

fern (any of numerous flowerless and seedless vascular plants having true roots from a rhizome and fronds that uncurl upward; reproduce by spores)

Holonyms ("bracken" is a member of...):

genus Pteridium; Pteridium (a genus of ferns belonging to the family Dennstaedtiaceae)

 Context examples 

A wide, open space lay before us—some hundreds of yards across—all green turf and low bracken growing to the very edge of the cliff.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

She hurried away, and I saw her afterwards seated amongst the bracken, her back turned towards the multitude, and her hands over her ears, cowering and wincing in an agony of apprehension.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

To the right of this stood, and stands to this day, an ancient barrow, or burying mound, covered deeply in a bristle of heather and bracken.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

I felt the consecration of its loneliness: my eye feasted on the outline of swell and sweep—on the wild colouring communicated to ridge and dell by moss, by heath-bell, by flower-sprinkled turf, by brilliant bracken, and mellow granite crag.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

I have been up on St. John’s Common upon a dark night, and, lying among the bracken, I have seen as many as seventy mules and a man at the head of each go flitting past me as silently as trout in a stream.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Once a white-necked sea eagle soared screaming high over the traveller's head, and again a flock of brown bustards popped up from among the bracken, and blundered away in their clumsy fashion, half running, half flying, with strident cry and whirr of wings.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

I had just made out that the gig contained a man and a woman, when suddenly I saw it swerve off the road, and come with a galloping horse and bounding wheels right across the moor, crashing through the gorse bushes, and sinking down to the hubs in the heather and bracken.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The broad strips of bracken glowed red and yellow against the black peaty soil, and a queenly doe who grazed among them turned her white front and her great questioning eyes towards the wayfarers.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Once it was a wild sow which scuttled out of the bracken, with two young sounders at her heels, and once a lordly red staggard walked daintily out from among the tree trunks, and looked around him with the fearless gaze of one who lived under the King's own high protection.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

As he raised himself to look over the bracken at his enemies, the staring color caught the eye of the bailiff, who broke into a long screeching whoop and spurred forward sword in hand.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)