Word.ws English Dictionary

devil's bit

devil's bit noun: a plant of species Succisa pratensis, native to Europe.

devil's bit: a plant of species Succisa pratensis, native to Europe
Image: Alaina Krakowiak, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

devil's bit

  1. A plant of species Succisa pratensis, native to Europe.
    Synonyms:
    devil's bit scabious
  2. A plant of species Chamaelirium luteum, native to North America.
    • A folk notion held that if corn kernels were steeped in Devil's-bit tea for 24 hours before sowing, birds would not eat them.2014, Steven Foster, James A. Duke, Peterson Field Guide to Medical Plants and Herbs of Eastern and Central North America, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, →ISBN, page 100
    Synonyms:
    blazing star

Synonyms of devil's bit

Forms of devil's bit

alternative formdevil's-bit

Origin of devil's bit

Calque of Latin morsus diaboli.

Questions about devil's bit

What does devil's bit mean?
Devil's bit means a plant of species Succisa pratensis, native to Europe.
What part of speech is devil's bit?
Devil's bit is a noun.

Words near devil's bit in the dictionary

  1. devil's apple
  2. devil's avocado
  3. devil's backbone
  4. devil's beating his wife
  5. devil's bed-posts
  6. devil's bit
  7. Devil's bolete
  8. devil's bones
  9. devil's books
  10. devil's bread
  11. devil's breath

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: devil's bit (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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