Wiktionary

prune

English

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Alternative forms

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Pronunciation

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Etymology 1

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From Middle English prune, from Old French prune,[1] from Vulgar Latin *prūna, feminine singular formed from the neutral plural of Latin prūnum, from Ancient Greek προῦνον (proûnon), variant of προῦμνον (proûmnon, “plum”), a loanword from a language of Asia Minor. Doublet of plum.

Noun

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prune (plural prunes)

  1. (obsolete) A plum.
  2. The dried, wrinkled fruit of certain species of plum.
    Hyponym: alubukhara
  3. (figurative) Something wrinkly like a prune.
    • 1970, Dana Densmore, “Without You And Within You”, in No More Fun & Games, volume 4, page 55:
      We are not free when we are in the grip of the false conditioning that decrees that we need sex. We are not free if we believe the culture's ominous warnings that we will become "horny" (what a callous, offensive word) and frustrated and neurotic and finally shrivel up into prunes and have to abandon hope of being good, creative, effective people.
  4. (slang) An old woman, especially a wrinkly one.
Synonyms
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Hypernyms
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Derived terms
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Translations
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Verb

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prune (third-person singular simple present prunes, present participle pruning, simple past and past participle pruned)

  1. (intransitive, informal) To become wrinkled like a dried plum, as the fingers and toes do when kept submerged in water.
    • 2005, Alycia Ripley, Traveling with an Eggplant, page 111:
      I hardly left that spot in my pool that month even when my fingers pruned and chlorine dried out my skin.

Etymology 2

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From Middle English prunen, prounen, proinen, from Old French proignier (“to trim the feathers with the beak”), earlier prooignier.[2] Likely influenced by Middle French rogner, Old French rooignier (“cut, trim”) (from Latin rotundo?), and possibly by Old French provainier (“provine”) (Latin propaginem? whence French provigner).[3] The relation to the noun is thus unclear.

Verb

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prune (third-person singular simple present prunes, present participle pruning, simple past and past participle pruned)

  1. (transitive, horticulture) To remove excess material from a tree or shrub; to trim, especially to make more healthy or productive.
    A good grape grower will prune the vines once a year.
  2. (transitive, figuratively) To cut down or shorten (by the removal of unnecessary material).
    to prune a budget, or an essay
  3. (transitive) To remove (something unnecessary) for the sake of cutting down or shortening that which it was previously part of.
    • 1990, Wayne Jancik, The Billboard Book of One-Hit Wonders, →ISBN, page 229:
      When internal dissension and a decline in popularity set in, Johnny was pruned from the Crests.
  4. (transitive, Internet slang) To remove participation status from or contributed material attributed to users usually deemed inactive or undesirable from an interactive computer service or website for the sake of housekeeping.
  5. (transitive, computer science) To remove unnecessary branches from a tree data structure.
  6. (obsolete, falconry) To trim the feathers with the beak.
  7. (obsolete) To preen; to prepare; to dress.
Derived terms
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Translations
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References

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  1. ^ “prūne, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 14 May 2025.
  2. ^ “proinen, v.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 14 May 2025.
  3. ^ Walther von Wartburg (1928–2002), “*rotundiare”, in Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch (in German), volume 10: R, page 519, after Friedrich Diez, Etymologisches Wörterbuch der romanischen Sprachen, fifth edition (1887), p. 671
  • “proignier”, in Anglo-Norman Dictionary, Aberystwyth University, 2022–2026
  • “provigner”, in Anglo-Norman Dictionary, Aberystwyth University, 2022–2026

Anagrams

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French

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French Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia fr

Etymology

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Inherited from Old French prune, from Vulgar Latin *prūna, feminine singular formed from the neutral plural of Latin prūnum, from Ancient Greek προῦμνον (proûmnon).

Pronunciation

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Noun

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prune f (plural prunes)

  1. plum
    pour des prunes ― (please add an English translation of this usage example)
  2. (slang) ticket (traffic citation)
    se prendre une prune ― (please add an English translation of this usage example)

Derived terms

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Further reading

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Latin

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Noun

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prūne

  1. vocative singular of prūnus

Middle English

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Alternative forms

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Etymology

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Borrowed from Old French prune, from Vulgar Latin *prūna, from Latin prūnum, from Ancient Greek προῦνον (proûnon), προῦμνον (proûmnon). Doublet of plomme. See above for the verb.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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prune (plural prunes)

  1. A plum (fruit of Prunus domestica)
  2. A prune (dried plum)
  3. (pathology) A large, rounded boil.

Descendants

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  • English: prune

References

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Old French

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Etymology

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From Vulgar Latin *prūna, feminine singular formed from the neutral plural of Latin prūnum.

Noun

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prune oblique singular, f (oblique plural prunes, nominative singular prune, nominative plural prunes)

  1. plum (fruit)

Descendants

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Romanian

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Pronunciation

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Noun

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prune

  1. plural of prună
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