sb. and a. Nat. Hist. [f. TRI- + VALVE, after bivalve.] a. sb. A shell having three valves. b. adj. Having three valves. Also Trivalved, † Trivalvous, Trivalvular adjs.
1776. Da Costa, Conchology, 278. These Shells are *trivalves, and have two large valves, with a small valve placed between them, near to the hinge.
1891. Cent. Dict., Trivalve, a. and n.
1856. W. Clark, Van der Hoeven’s Zool., I. 190. Head *trivalved.
1681. Grew, Musæum, II. I. iv. 198. *Trivalvous, i.e. composed of three sides or Plates joyned together by the length of the Shell.
1693. Sir T. P. Blount, Nat. Hist., 60. Bauhinus Pictures it [the Ginger plant] … with a trivalvous Cod.
1785. Martyn, Rousseau’s Bot., xx. (1794), 278. Purslain has … a capsule of one cell…; in some species it opens horizontally, in others it is *trivalvular.
