vegetable

plural vegetables · alternative obsolete vegitable

1. archaicAny plant.

   That he might ascertain whether any of the cloths of ancient Egypt were made of hemp, M. Dutrochet has examined with the microscope the weavable filaments of this last vegetable.

   1837, The Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal, volume 23, page 222

   1 more example

   The first of the tall trees was reached, and by the bearings proved the wrong one. So with the second. The third rose nearly two hundred feet into the air above a clump of underwood — a giant of a vegetable, with a red column as big as a cottage, and a wide shadow around in which a company could have manoeuvred.

   1881–1882, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, London; Paris: Cassell & Company, published 14 November 1883, →OCLC

2. A plant raised for some edible part of it, such as the leaves, roots, fruit or flowers, but excluding any plant considered to be a fruit, grain, herb, or spice in the culinary sense, and usually including non-plants lumped into the same culinary category, such as edible mushrooms and seaweed.

   It’s true that agriculture at the time was organic, food was locally produced and there were no ultraprocessed foods. But fresh fruits and vegetables were in short supply because they were difficult to ship and because growing seasons were so short.

   2025 January 13, Gina Kolata, “Have Americans Ever Really Been Healthy?”, in The New York Times, archived from the original on 14 Jan 2025

   Synonyms: veg, veggie

3. The edible part of such a plant.

   Synonyms: veg, veggie

4. derogatoryfigurativelyoftenA person whose brain (or, infrequently, whose body) has been damaged to the point that they cannot interact with the surrounding environment; a person in a persistent vegetative state.

   Synonyms: cabbage

5. historicalslangRAFA mine (explosive device).

alternative obsolete vegitable

1. not comparableOf or relating to plants.

   This substance is vegetable, not mineral.

   1 more example

   On an early winter afternoon, clear but not cold, when the vegetable world was a weird multitude of skeletons through whose ribs the sun shone freely, a gleaming landau came to a pause on the crest of a hill in Wessex.

   1882, Thomas Hardy, chapter I, in Two on a Tower. A Romance. [...] In Three Volumes, volume I, London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, & Rivington, […], →OCLC, page 1

2. not comparableOf or relating to vegetables.