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cinquefoil Definition

cinque·foil (siŋk′fo̵il′)

noun

  1. any of a genus (Potentilla) of plants of the rose family, with white, yellow, or red flowers and fruit like a dry strawberry: some species have compound leaves with five leaflets arranged like the fingers on a hand
  2. Archit. a circular design made up of five converging arcs

Etymology: ME cink foil < OFr cinquefoil < It cinquefoglie < L quinquefolium < quinque, five + folium, leaf: see foliate

cinquefoil Usage Examples

Converse of object

  • include: High up in Wharfedale the scars and screes support a range of plants including the nationally scarce alpine cinquefoil and hoary whitlowgrass.
  • creep: Creeping cinquefoil Potentilla reptans Creeping Thistle Cirsium arvense Dewberry Rubus caesius Dog Rose Rosa canina Downy Rose Rosa mollis agg.

Adjective modifier

  • alpine: High up in Wharfedale the scars and screes support a range of plants including the nationally scarce alpine cinquefoil and hoary whitlowgrass.
  • central: West wall: two-centred arch to the window with three cusped, two-centred lights and a central cinquefoil above.

Modifies a noun

  • tracery: Windows with two-centred arches containing three lights with cinquefoil tracery.
  • head: All four sides are slate hung with vertical planking on either side of double louvered windows with cinquefoil heads, all in wood.
  • cusping: Over it is a sixteenth-century square-headed window, with two wide lights, to which cinquefoil cusping in Bath stone has been added.
  • light: Two windows in south wall of three cinquefoil lights with vertical tracery.

Noun used with modifier

  • marsh: Plants include mosses eg Sphagnum, cotton grass, purple moor grass, cranberry, marsh cinquefoil, marsh violet and round leaved sundew.
  • ermine: The black chief, with the ermine cinquefoil, from the arms of the County Council, represents the Leicestershire coalfield.