cucurbita

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A form of cucurbit — Any member of the family Cucurbitaceae of gourds.

UncommonScrabble 15

Meanings

nouncucurbita (plural cucurbitas)

plural cucurbitas

  1. alternativeAlternative form of cucurbit (plant).

    “But where can I get the gourds—I beg your pardon, the cucurbitas?’

    1895 April 24, W. M. W. VanNess, “Vases”, in The Herald and Presbyter: A Presbyterian Family Paper, volume LVI, number 17, Cincinnati, Ohio, page 26
    2 more examples

    To the gourd growers and potters reaching America, would not the most obvious candidate in this strange botanical world be the most gourdlike plant, hence the cucurbitas? The suggestion has been made that the earliest use of the cucurbitas was for their seeds.

    1977, George F. Carter, “A Hypothesis Suggesting a Single Origin of Agriculture”, in Charles A. Reed, editor, Origins of Agriculture, The Hague; Paris: Mouton Publishers, →ISBN, section two (Worldwide Concepts), page 123

    There are some registrations that associate the cucurbitas to the origin of the agriculture and the civilization. They are also among the first species of plants to be domesticated. Some evidences showed that the mixture of cucurbitas, corn, and beans was the nutritional base of the pre-Columbian civilizations (Withaker and Bemis, 1975).

    2019, Marina F. de-Escalada-Pla, Silvia K. Flores, Adriana P. Castellanos-Fuentes, Carolina E. Genevois, edited by Alexandru Grumezescu and Alina Maria Holban, Value-Added Ingredients and Enrichments of Beverages (The Science of Beverages; volume 14), Woodhead Publishing, →ISBN, section 2 (C. moschata Tissue as Raw Material for Functional Food and Ingredient Development), page 207
Cite this entry
APA

cucurbita. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cucurbita

MLA

“cucurbita.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cucurbita. Accessed November 3, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “cucurbita,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cucurbita.

Source: cucurbita on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.