Cycad

Pronunciation

• UK IPA: /ˈsʌɪkÉ™d/, /ˈsʌɪkad/

Origin

From New Latin Cycas ("genus of tropical trees")

Full definition of cycad

Noun

1. (botany) Any plant of the division Cycadophyta, as the sago palm, etc.
• 1933, Clark Ashton Smith, ‘Ubbo-Sathla’:Then, after incomputable years, he was no longer man but a man-like beast, roving in forests of giant fern and calamite, or building an uncouth nest in the boughs of mighty cycads.
• 2000, JG Ballard, Super-Cannes, Fourth Estate 2011, p. 7:I began to count the pools, each a flare of turquoise light lost behind the high walls of the villas with their screens of cycads and bougainvillaea.

Derived terms

• cycadian
• cycadean