Library / English Dictionary

BERRY

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

Irregular inflected form: berried   

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Any of numerous small and pulpy edible fruits; used as desserts or in making jams and jellies and preserves

Classified under:

Nouns denoting foods and drinks

Hypernyms ("berry" is a kind of...):

edible fruit (edible reproductive body of a seed plant especially one having sweet flesh)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "berry"):

mulberry (sweet usually dark purple blackberry-like fruit of any of several mulberry trees of the genus Morus)

acerola; barbados cherry; surinam cherry; West Indian cherry (acid red or yellow cherry-like fruit of a tropical American shrub very rich in vitamin C)

persimmon (orange fruit resembling a plum; edible when fully ripe)

hackberry; sugarberry (small edible dark purple to black berry with large pits; southern United States)

strawberry (sweet fleshy red fruit)

juneberry; saskatoon; serviceberry; shadberry (edible purple or red berries)

raspberry (red or black edible aggregate berries usually smaller than the related blackberries)

loganberry (large red variety of the dewberry)

dewberry (blackberry-like fruits of any of several trailing blackberry bushes)

boysenberry (large raspberry-flavored fruit; cross between blackberries and raspberries)

blackberry (large sweet black or very dark purple edible aggregate fruit of any of various bushes of the genus Rubus)

currant (any of several tart red or black berries used primarily for jellies and jams)

cowberry; lingonberry; lowbush cranberry; mountain cranberry (tart red berries similar to American cranberries but smaller)

cranberry (very tart red berry used for sauce or juice)

boxberry; checkerberry; spiceberry; teaberry; wintergreen (spicy red berrylike fruit; source of wintergreen oil)

blueberry (sweet edible dark-blue berries of either low-growing or high-growing blueberry plants)

huckleberry (blue-black berry similar to blueberries and bilberries of the eastern United States)

bilberry; European blueberry; whortleberry (blue-black berries similar to American blueberries)

Holonyms ("berry" is a part of...):

berry (a small fruit having any of various structures, e.g., simple (grape or blueberry) or aggregate (blackberry or raspberry))

Derivation:

berry (pick or gather berries)

Sense 2

Meaning:

United States rock singer (born in 1931)

Synonyms:

Berry; Charles Edward Berry; Chuck Berry

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Instance hypernyms:

rock star (a famous singer of rock music)

Sense 3

Meaning:

A small fruit having any of various structures, e.g., simple (grape or blueberry) or aggregate (blackberry or raspberry)

Classified under:

Nouns denoting plants

Hypernyms ("berry" is a kind of...):

fruit (the ripened reproductive body of a seed plant)

Meronyms (parts of "berry"):

berry (any of numerous small and pulpy edible fruits; used as desserts or in making jams and jellies and preserves)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "berry"):

cranberry (very tart red berry used for sauce or juice)

baneberry (a poisonous berry of a plant of the genus Actaea)

bacca; simple fruit (an indehiscent fruit derived from a single ovary having one or many seeds within a fleshy wall or pericarp: e.g. grape; tomato; cranberry)

Derivation:

berry (pick or gather berries)

 II. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Pick or gather berries

Example:

We went berrying in the summer

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Hypernyms (to "berry" is one way to...):

cull; pick; pluck (look for and gather)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "berry"):

blackberry (pick or gather blackberries)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Sentence example:

In the summer they like to go out and berry

Derivation:

berry (any of numerous small and pulpy edible fruits; used as desserts or in making jams and jellies and preserves)

berry (a small fruit having any of various structures, e.g., simple (grape or blueberry) or aggregate (blackberry or raspberry))

Credits

 Context examples: 

The essential oil extracted from juniper berries.

(Juniper Berry Oil, NCI Thesaurus)

Also called chaste tree berry and Vitex.

(Monk’s pepper, NCI Dictionary)

They often ran about the forest alone and gathered red berries, and no beasts did them any harm, but came close to them trustfully.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

Besides high amounts of vitamins, minerals and fatty acids, acai berry is rich in phytonutrients such as anthocyanins and flavones which are potent scavengers of reactive oxygen species.

(Acai Berry Juice, NCI Thesaurus)

The man knew there was no nourishment in the berries, but he chewed them patiently with a hope greater than knowledge and defying experience.

(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)

"There's salt here," said Laurie, as he handed Jo a saucer of berries.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

He inspected the grass beneath him, the moss-berry plant just beyond, and the dead trunk of the blasted pine that stood on the edge of an open space among the trees.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

There were great stables, where a dozen grooms and boys held forth, rows of vine-clad servants’ cottages, an endless and orderly array of outhouses, long grape arbors, green pastures, orchards, and berry patches.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

Marooned three years agone, he continued, and lived on goats since then, and berries, and oysters.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

I confess, I wanted the coffee badly; and I learned, not long afterward, that the berry was likewise a little weakness of Maud’s.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)