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Webster 1913 Edition


Cinchona

Cin-cho′na

,
Noun.
[So named from the wife of Count
Chinchon
, viceroy of Peru in the seventeenth century, who by its use was freed from an intermittent fever, and after her return to Spain, contributed to the general propagation of this remedy.]
1.
(Bot.)
A genus of trees growing naturally on the Andes in Peru and adjacent countries, but now cultivated in the East Indies, producing a medicinal bark of great value.
2.
(Med.)
The bark of any species of
Cinchona
containing three per cent. or more of bitter febrifuge alkaloids; Peruvian bark; Jesuits’ bark.

Webster 1828 Edition


Cinchona

CINCHONA

,
Noun.
The Peruvian bark, quinquina, of which there are three varieties, the red, yellow and pale.

Definition 2024


Cinchona

Cinchona

See also: cinchona

Translingual

Cinchona officinalis bark, from which quinine is obtained.

Proper noun

Cinchona f

  1. A taxonomic genus within the family Rubiaceae – the cinchona trees.

Hypernyms

Hyponyms

cinchona

cinchona

See also: Cinchona

English

Alternative forms

  • (hypercorrect): chinchona
  • (misspelling): chincona

Noun

cinchona (plural cinchonas)

  1. A tree or shrub of the genus Cinchona, native to the Andes in South America but since widely cultivated in Indonesia and India as well for its medicinal bark.
    • 2001, Leslie Iversen, Drugs: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford 2001, p. 8)
      German chemists were the first to isolate pure drug chemicals from herbal medicines, with the isolation of morphine from crude opium in 1803 and quinine from the bark of the cinchona tree in 1820.
  2. The bark of these plants, which yield quinine and other alkaloids useful in reducing fevers and particularly in combatting malaria.
  3. (medicine) Any medicine chiefly composed of the prepared bark of these plants.

Synonyms

Derived terms

  • cinchonal
  • cinchona red

Related terms

Translations