fern

Meaning

Noun

• Any of a group of some twenty thousand species of vascular plants classified in the division Pteridophyta that lack seeds and reproduce by shedding spores to initiate an alternation of generations.

Related

Similar words

• Filicophyta (division)

Origin

• From Middle English fern, from Old English fearn, from Proto-West Germanic *farn, from Proto-Indo-European *pornóm ("feather, wing; fern, leaf"), from *p(t)erH-. Cognate with West Frisian fear, Dutch varen, German Farn, Lithuanian spar̃nas, Avestan 𐬞𐬀𐬭𐬆𐬥𐬀, Kamkata-viri por, Sanskrit पर्ण.