Word.ws English Dictionary

cyme

UK/saɪm/

cyme noun: a “head” (of unexpanded leaves, etc.); an opening bud. Also the misspelling of senna.

cyme: a “head” (of unexpanded leaves, etc.); an opening bud
Image: supermartl, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

cyme (plural cymes)

  1. (obsolete, rare) A “head” (of unexpanded leaves, etc.); an opening bud.
  2. A flattish or convex flower cluster, of the centrifugal or determinate type, on which each axis terminates with a flower which blooms before the flowers below it.
    • The inflorescence is some form of cyme, and the flowers are usually regular.1906, “Gentianaceæ”, in Daniel Coit Gilman, Harry Thurston Peck, Frank Moore Colby, editors, The New International Encyclopædia
    • The plant bears small groups of two or three yellowish coloured flowers on an axillary cyme.2003, S. M. Reddy, S. J. Chary, University Botany 2: Gymnosperms, Plant Anatomy, Genetics, Ecology, page 190
  3. A cyma.

Also used as

cyme is also the misspelling of senna.

Forms of cyme

pluralcymes
alternative formcime

Origin of cyme

] Borrowed from French cime, cyme (“top, summit”), from Vulgar Latin *cima, from Latin cȳma (“young sprout of a cabbage”, “spring shoots of cabbage”), from Ancient Greek κῦμα (kûma, “anything swollen, such as a wave or billow”; “fetus”, “embryo”, “sprout of a plant”), from κύω (kúō, “to conceive”, “to become pregnant”; in the aorist “to impregnate”). For considerably more information, see cyma, which is an etymological doublet. Compare also Frankish *kīmō (“sprout”), from Proto-Germanic *kīmô, whence German Keim (“sprout”).

An error for cynne, probably resulting from the overlapping of the two ens in handwriting.

Words formed from cyme

Words that rhyme with cyme

31 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about cyme

What does cyme mean?
Cyme means a “head” (of unexpanded leaves, etc.); an opening bud.
What part of speech is cyme?
Cyme is a noun.
How do you pronounce cyme?
Cyme is pronounced /saɪm/ (UK).
What is the plural of cyme?
The plural of cyme is cymes.

Words near cyme in the dictionary

  1. cymbium
  2. cymbling
  3. cymblings
  4. cymbuliid
  5. cymbuliids
  6. cyme
  7. cymegesolate
  8. cymelet
  9. cymelets
  10. cymene
  11. cymenes

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: cyme (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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