Cow-parsnip

[COW sb.¹ 9.]

  1.  A large umbelliferous plant, Heracleum Sphondylium, wild in Britain: so named by Turner.

1548.  Turner, Names of Herbes, 76. Sphondilium … It may be called in englishe Cowpersnepe or rough Persnepe. It groweth in watery middowes and in ranke groundes about hedges.

1578.  Lyte, Dodoens, IV. lxvi. 528. Turner calleth it Cowe Parsnep, or Medo Parsnep.

1579.  Langham, Gard. Health (1633), 169. Cowparsnip or Wilde carrat growing in medows…. Some seethe it in drinke with leuen, and vse it instead of Ale or Beere.

1882.  Garden, 6 May, 306/2. Cow Parsnip … is in no way injurious to animals.

  2.  Used as a generic name of all species of Heracleum, e.g., American C., H. lanatum, Giant C. of Kamtschatka, H. giganteum, etc.

1780.  Coxe, Russ. Disc., 52. There are no trees upon the island; it produces, however, the cow-parsnip which grows at Kamtchatka.