Meaning & use
rowan
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Meanings
nouncountable
A small tree with feathery leaves, white spring flowers and bright orange-red berries, found mainly in cool northern regions.
Grammar: Countable for the tree: a rowan stood by the gate. Usually called mountain ash in North America.
Patterns
- a rowan tree
- rowan berries
A rowan grew beside the old stone wall.
Birds stripped the rowan of its berries by November.
We planted a rowan in the front garden for the autumn color.
noununcountable
The wood or the berries of this tree, used for jellies, tools or in old folk customs against bad luck.
Grammar: Used without an article when it means the material: a handle made of rowan.
Patterns
- rowan jelly
- made of rowan
Rowan jelly goes well with roast meat.
Highland farmers once hung rowan above the barn door for protection.
The walking stick was cut from rowan.
Word forms
| plural | rowans |
|---|
Common combinations
- rowan tree
- The rowan tree was covered in red berries.
- rowan berries
- Waxwings arrive in winter to feed on rowan berries.
- rowan jelly
- She served rowan jelly with the lamb.
- mountain rowan
- A mountain rowan clung to the rocky slope.
- rowan wood
- Rowan wood is tough and fine-grained.
Synonyms and how they differ
- mountain ash
- Mountain ash is the common American name for the same tree, though it is not a true ash tree.
- quickbeam
- Quickbeam is an old regional name for rowan and sounds archaic or poetic.
Word family
- rowanberry noun
- the small red fruit of the rowan tree
- rowans noun
- more than one rowan tree
Commonly confused: rowan or rowen? rowan or rowing?
rowan vs rowen
Rowen is a rare farming word for the second crop of hay in a season, while rowan is the tree.
rowan vs rowing
Rowing means moving a boat with oars and is pronounced differently from rowan.
Practice
Bright orange berries hung from the ___ beside the cottage, and the birds soon found them.
Choose one answer.
A rowan is a tree that bears orange-red berries. A raven is a bird, a reed is a plant of wet ground and a rung is part of a ladder.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “rowan”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.