passionflowers

Noun

passionflower (plural passionflowers)

1. Any of very many vines, in North America and elsewhere, of the genus Passiflora that bear edible fruit called passion fruit, and showy flowers of a structure symbolic of the Passion of Christ.
   • The Priests observed frequent fasts, and abstained at all times from certain animals and fruits, especially from the Granadilla, the fruit of the Passion-flower, because, say the lying Jesuits, of the mysteries which are signified in that marvellous blossom: the people also were frequently required...1819, Robert Southey, chapter XXXIV, in History of Brazil, 3rd part, London: […] [William Pople] for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […], →OCLC, page 185
2. The flower of this plant.