[f. BRANCH sb. + -ERY.] Branches collectively. lit. and fig.
1830. Coleridge, Ch. & St. (1839), 131, note. To graft, one by one, the whole branchery of Papal superstition and imposture.
1847. Sara Coleridge, in Biog. Lit., Introd. 125. All the branchery of mystic beliefs and superstitious practices.
1855. Bailey, Mystic, 85. That tree … From whose umbrageous branchery human fruit … In sacred ripeness dropped.
† b. Applied by Grew to: The ramifications of the endocarp in an apple or other fruit.
1674. Grew, Anat. Plants, I. vi. § 2. The Branchery is nothing else but the Ramifications of the Lignous Body throughout all the parts of the Parenchyma.
1753. Chambers, Cycl. Supp., s.v. Apple, The branchery, or vessels are only ramifications of the woody part of the branch.
