fruit
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English
Etymology
From Middle English fruyt, frut (“fruits and vegetables”), from Old French fruit (“produce, fruits and vegetables”), from Latin frūctus (“enjoyment, proceeds, profits, produce, income”) and frūx (“crop, produce, fruit”) (compare Latin fruor (“have the benefit of, to use, to enjoy”)), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰruHg- (“to make use of, to have enjoyment of”). Cognate with English brook (“to bear, tolerate”) and German brauchen (“to need”). Displaced native Old English wæstm.
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Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) enPR: fro͞ot, IPA(key): /fɹuːt/
- (General American) IPA(key): /fɹut/
Audio (US) (file) Audio (UK) (file) Audio (file) - Rhymes: -uːt
Noun
fruit (countable and uncountable, plural fruits) (see Usage notes for discussion of plural)
- (botany) A product of fertilization in a plant, specifically:
- 1640, John Parkinson, Theatrum botanicum: the Theater of Plants; or, An Herball of a Large Extent, London, page 1063:
- [A]fter the flower is past commeth the fruit in long pods, every seede bunching out like the pods of Orobus and as bigge almost as the smaller Pease.
- The seed-bearing part of a plant; often edible, colourful, fragrant, and sweet or sour; produced from a floral ovary after fertilization.
- The spores of cryptogams and their accessory organs.
- Any sweet or sour, edible part of a plant that resembles seed-bearing fruit (see former sense) even if it does not develop from a floral ovary.
- An end result, effect, or consequence; advantageous or disadvantageous result.
- His long nights in the office eventually bore fruit when his business boomed and he was given a raise.
- c. 1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Richard the Third: ”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies (First Folio), London: Isaac Iaggard, and Ed Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, :
- the fruit of rashness
- 1611, The Holy Bible, (King James Version), London: Robert Barker, , →OCLC, Isaiah 3:10:
- They shall eat the fruit of their doings.
- 1849–1861, Thomas Babington Macaulay, chapter 20, in The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, volumes (please specify |volume=I to V), London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, →OCLC:
- The fruits of this education became visible.
- 2019 July 11, John Thornhill, “Does tech threaten to rerun the worst of the Industrial Revolution?”, in Financial Times:
- It is incontestably the case that future generations enjoyed the extraordinary fruits of the Industrial Revolution’s “great enrichment”.
- (attributive) Of, belonging to, related to, or having fruit or its characteristics; (of living things) producing or consuming fruit.
- fresh-squeezed fruit juice
- a fruit salad
- an artificial fruit flavor
- a fruit tree
- (dated, colloquial, derogatory) A homosexual man; (derogatory, figurative) an effeminate man.
- 1977 [1953], William S. Burroughs, edited by Allen Ginsberg, Junky, Penguin Books, →ISBN, page 66:
- "Moishe just checked in," he said. "He's a panhandler and a fruit. A disgrace to the Jewish race."
- 1984, This is Spinal Tap, spoken by Ian Faith (Tony Hendra):
- I'm not talking to this twisted fruit anymore!
- 1997, Daniel Clowes, “Garage Sale”, in Ghost World, Jonathan Cape, published 2000, →ISBN, page 15:
- Aww, but he's so cute! / He's a fruit… Oh my fucking god! You will not believe who was here today!
- (archaic) Offspring from a sexual union.
- The litter was the fruit of the union between our whippet and their terrier.
- c. 1591–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Third Part of Henry the Sixt, ”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies (First Folio), London: Isaac Iaggard, and Ed Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, :
- King Edward's fruit, true heir to the English crown
- 1611, The Holy Bible, (King James Version), London: Robert Barker, , →OCLC, Luke 1:42:
- And she spake out with a loud voyce, and saide, Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruite of thy wombe.
- (informal) A crazy person.
Usage notes
- In the botanical and figurative senses, fruit is usually treated as uncountable:
- a bowl of fruit; eat plenty of fruit; the tree provides fruit.
- fruits is also sometimes used as the plural in the botanical sense:
- berries, achenes, and nuts are all fruits; the fruits of this plant split into two parts.
- When fruit is treated as uncountable in the botanical sense, a piece of fruit is often used as a singulative.
- In senses other than the botanical or figurative ones derived from the botanical sense, the plural is fruits.
- The culinary sense often does not cover true fruits that are savoury or used chiefly in savoury foods, such as tomatoes and peas. These are normally described simply as vegetables.
Hyponyms
Derived terms
Derived from fruit (literal, vegetal)
- afterfruit
- bear fruit
- befruit
- forefruit
- fruitage
- fruitarian
- fruit body
- fruit bowl
- fruitcake
- fruit cocktail
- fruiten
- fruiter
- fruiterer
- fruitful
- fruitfully
- fruitfulness
- fruitgrowing
- fruit-growing
- fruiting
- fruition
- fruitless
- fruitly
- fruit market
- fruit salad
- fruit-set
- fruit shop
- fruit tea
- fruit tree
- fruit-tree
- fruit-trencher
- fruit wine
- fruity
- grapefruit
- in fruit
- jackfruit
- key fruit
- milk fruit
- miraculous fruit
- monkey fruit
- old fruit
- passion fruit
- pickle fruit
- Sharon fruit
- star fruit, starfruit
- stone fruit
Derived from fruit (figurative)
other derived terms (unsorted)
- accessory fruit
- aggregate fruit
- angry fruit salad
- atoll fruit dove
- bag of fruit
- beautiful fruit dove
- blue sausage fruit
- brandy fruit
- butter fruit
- by their fruits you will know them
- cackle fruit
- candied fruit
- citrus fruit
- collective fruit
- cream-fruit
- crotch fruit
- desert fruit cake
- doum fruit
- dried fruit
- egg fruit
- false fruit
- forbidden fruit is the sweetest
- fruit and flowers
- fruit bat
- fruit-bearing
- fruit borer
- fruit bouquet
- fruit brandy
- fruit cake
- fruit-cake
- fruit crush
- fruit cup
- fruit curd
- fruit dot
- fruit-dove
- fruit dove
- fruit drop
- fruit-eater
- fruit fall
- fruit fly
- fruit ice
- fruit juice
- fruit leather
- fruit loop
- fruit loops
- fruit machine
- fruit of the sea
- fruit pigeon
- fruit punch
- fruit rollup
- fruit salt
- fruit smoothie
- fruit sugar
- fruit-time
- fruit up
- fruit vegetable
- fruit wall
- fruit wine
- fruit-wood
- golden fruit dove
- green fruit beetle
- hand fruit
- high-hanging fruit
- Irish fruit
- jack fruit
- jack-fruit
- key-fruit
- kiwi fruit
- low hanging fruit
- low-hanging fruit
- Mediterranean fruit fly
- miracle fruit
- monk fruit
- multiple fruit
- nutty as a fruit cake
- Oriental fruit moth
- oyster fruit
- peach fruit moth
- rose-crowned fruit-dove
- saguaro fruit
- simple fruit
- snake fruit
- soft fruit
- spore fruit
- top fruit
- ugli fruit
- uniq fruit
Related terms
Descendants
Translations
part of plant
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food
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figuratively: positive end result or reward of labour or effort
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figuratively: child of a marriage
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offensive slang: homosexual or effeminate man
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Verb
fruit (third-person singular simple present fruits, present participle fruiting, simple past and past participle fruited)
- To produce fruit, seeds, or spores.
- 1910, Canada Experimental Farms Service, Report of the Dominion Experimental Farms:
- It may be said, however, that the percentage of green apples among the Fameuse seedlings is much less than among the others as out of 33 Fameuse seedlings which had fruited up to this year, none was green and we recollect but one light coloured Fameuse seedling fruiting this year.
- 1998, Randy Molina, David Pilz, Managing Forest Ecosystems to Conserve Fungus Diversity and Sustain Wild Mushroom Harvests, →ISBN, page 10:
- For example, chanterelles and russulas can start fruiting in early to mid summer given sufficient moisture, but other species, such as matsutake, rarely fruit until temperatures cool in the autumn, even if moisture is available earlier.
- 2014, David Mitchell, The Bone Clocks, →ISBN, page 12:
- The grass and weeds come up to my waist and the plum trees are already fruiting up, though most of the fruit'll go to the wasps and the worms, Vinny says, 'cause he can't be arsed to pick it.
Translations
to produce fruit
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See also
- Category:Fruits for a list of fruits
- fruiting (in aviation)
Further reading
Fruit on Wikipedia.Wikipedia - List of fruits on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
Catalan
Etymology
Pronunciation
Noun
fruit m (plural fruits)
- fruit
- offspring
- el fruit de les seves entranyes ― the fruit of his loins
- result, consequence
- Synonyms: efecte, conseqüència
- profit, benefit
Derived terms
Related terms
References
- “fruit” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
- “fruit”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2024
- “fruit” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
- “fruit” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.
Dutch
Pronunciation
Etymology 1
From Middle Dutch fruut, froyt, from Old French fruit, from Latin frūctus. Doublet of vrucht.
Noun
fruit n (uncountable)
- (usually collective) fruit (produced by trees or bushes, or any sweet vegetable; only literal sense)
Synonyms
Derived terms
- fruit types
Related terms
Descendants
- Berbice Creole Dutch: frutu
Etymology 2
From Middle Dutch fruten, older friten (“to fry”), from Old French frit, past participle of frire (“to fry”).
Verb
fruit
- inflection of fruiten:
French
Etymology
Inherited from Middle French fruict, a latinized spelling of Old French fruit, from Latin frūctus (“enjoyment, proceeds, profits, produce, income”), a derivative of fruor (“have the benefit of, to use, to enjoy”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰruHg- (“to make use of, to have enjoyment of”).
Pronunciation
Noun
fruit m (plural fruits)
Derived terms
Descendants
- Haitian Creole: fwi
Further reading
- “fruit”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé , 2012.
Middle English
Noun
fruit
- Alternative form of fruyt
Old French
Etymology
Pronunciation
Noun
fruit oblique singular, m (oblique plural fruiz or fruitz, nominative singular fruiz or fruitz, nominative plural fruit)
- fruit
- c. 1170, Christian of Troyes, Érec et Énide:
- Oisiaus et veneison et fruit
- bird, venison and fruit
Descendants
- Gallo: frut
- Middle French: fruict
- Norman: frit
- Picard: frut
- Walloon: frut
- → Middle Dutch: fruut, froyt
- Dutch: fruit
- → Middle English: fruyt, freut, fruct, fruit, frut, frute
West Frisian
Pronunciation
Noun
fruit n (no plural)
References
- J. W. Zantema, Frysk wurdboek. Deel 1: Frysk - Nederlânsk, 11e printige, page 315