noun
- any of a genus (Cinchona) of tropical South American trees of the madder family, from the bark of which quinine and related medicinal alkaloids are obtained: the trees are widely cultivated in Asia and the East Indies
- the bitter bark of these trees
Origin:
ModL: coined by Carolus Linnaeus after the Countess del Chinchón, wife of a 17th-c. Peruvian viceroy, who was treated for fever with the bark