Word.ws English Dictionary

pellitory of the wall

pellitory of the wall noun: a plant of the species Parietaria officinalis, that has greenish flowers and often grows on walls (eastern pellitory-of-the-wall).

pellitory of the wall: a plant of the species Parietaria officinalis, that has greenish flowers and often grows on walls...
Image: Franz Xaver, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

pellitory of the wall

  1. A plant of the species Parietaria officinalis, that has greenish flowers and often grows on walls (eastern pellitory-of-the-wall).
    • Leonardo Fioravanti, an Italian Physitian, beside many other secrets, assumeth unto himself the discovery of one concerning Pellitory of the Wall; that is, that it never groweth in the sight of the North star.1646, Thomas Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica, I.7
    • The juice of Pellitory-of-the-Wall clarified and boiled into a syrup with honey, and a spoonful of it drunk every morning by such as are subject to the dropsy; if continuing that course though but once a week, if ever they have the dropsy, let them come but to me and I will cure them gratis.1653, Nicholas Culpeper, The English Physician Enlarged, Folio Society, published 2007, page 216
  2. Parietaria judaica (spreading pellitory)

Origin of pellitory of the wall

Etymologically a tautology.

Questions about pellitory of the wall

What does pellitory of the wall mean?
Pellitory of the wall means a plant of the species Parietaria officinalis, that has greenish flowers and often grows on walls (eastern pellitory-of-the-wall).
What part of speech is pellitory of the wall?
Pellitory of the wall is a noun.

Words near pellitory of the wall in the dictionary

  1. pellistors
  2. pellitories
  3. pellitorine
  4. pellitory
  5. pellitory of Spain
  6. pellitory of the wall
  7. pellitory-of-the-wall
  8. Pellman
  9. Pellmans
  10. pellmell
  11. Pello

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: pellitory of the wall (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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