woad-waxen
nounEtymology From Old English wuduweaxe.
1
The leguminous plant Genista tinctoria, native to Europe.
- The woad waxen (Genista tinctoria), common enough near Salem, is seldom found inland, and the same holds good for the barberry and privet, which grow so abundantly near the coast and which have probably been introduced for two hundred years.1898, Annual Report of the Secretary of the Board of Agriculture, Massachusetts State Board of Agriculture, Volume 45, Part 1897, page 273:
- […]but after a time he left the sages, and leaped above the mayweeds, the felt-wyrts, the savouries, and the woad-waxens.1941, Eva Roe Gaggin, Down Ryton Water, published 1998, page 24:
1 more example
- Woad-waxen, which in modern English is wax-weed, was one of the plants of many virtues brought by the earliest Pilgrims,[…].1981, S. N. F. Sanford, Country Herbs, page 20: