thyme
/tʌɪm
/noun [mass noun]
A low-growing aromatic plant of the mint family. The small leaves are used as a culinary herb and the plant yields a medicinal oil.
- Genus Thymus, family Labiatae: many species, in particular common (or garden) thyme (T. vulgaris).
- Other powerful herbs include dill, garden thyme, rosemary and peppermint.
- Home grown herbs would have included coriander, dill, thyme, opium poppy and summer savoury.
Derivatives
thymy
- Peppered Parmesan ‘French fries’ were all peppery at the front of the tongue and thymy at the back.
- The air is sweetened by the thymy odours of mountain and moor.
- Above hung the thymy hill where dry grasses and bracken murmured or screamed in the wind.
Origin
Middle English: from Old French thym, via Latin from Greek thumon, from thuein 'burn, sacrifice'.