Fern
name, noun ·Common ·High school level
Definitions
- 1 Any of a group of some twenty thousand species of vascular plants classified in the division Pteridophyta that lack seeds and reproduce by shedding spores to initiate an alternation of generations.
"Beyond here the tides are not felt, and we now entered upon a district of elevated forest, with a finer vegetation. Large trees stretch out their arms across the stream, and the steep, earthy banks are clothed with ferns and zingiberaceous plants."
- 2 any of numerous flowerless and seedless vascular plants having true roots from a rhizome and fronds that uncurl upward; reproduce by spores wordnet
- 1 A female given name.
""Charlotte is the best storyteller I ever heard," said Fern, poking her dish towel into a cereal bowl."
- 2 A topographic surname.
Example
More examples"On that very night when the fern blooms — I’m just retelling what has been compiled in fairy tales by local people — the mermaids, wood and house goblins, werewolves, nixes, and different kinds of ghosts and sorcerers gathered together."
Etymology
From Middle English fern, from Old English fearn, from Proto-West Germanic *farn, from Proto-Indo-European *pornóm (“feather, wing; fern, leaf”), from *p(t)erH- (“fern”). Cognate with Scots fairn (“fern”), West Frisian fear (“fern”), Dutch varen (“fern”), German Farn, Farm (“fern”), Luxembourgish Far (“fern”), Lithuanian spar̃nas (“wing”), Avestan 𐬞𐬀𐬭𐬆𐬥𐬀 (par^əna), Ashkun pār (“leaf”), Kamkata-viri por, přor, Prasuni parëg (“leaf”), Sanskrit पर्ण (parṇá, “wing”).
From fern; in the case of the surname, it was given to someone who lived in a place where there was an abundance of these plants.
Related phrases
More for "fern"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.