silphium
silphium noun: a plant, thought to be extinct, used in Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome in cooking and as a contraceptive.
Noun
silphium (plural silphiums or silphia)
- A plant, thought to be extinct, used in Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome in cooking and as a contraceptive.
- Of all the mysteries of ancient Rome, silphium is among the most intriguing. Romans loved the herb as much as we love chocolate. They used silphium as perfume, as medicine, as an aphrodisiac and turned it into a condiment, called laser, that they poured on to almost every dish.2022 May 15, James Tapper, “Caesar’s favourite herb was the Viagra of ancient Rome. Until climate change killed it off”, in The Observer
Synonyms of silphium
Forms of silphium
| plural | silphiums |
|---|---|
| plural | silphia |
| alternative form | silfium |
| alternative form | silphion |
Origin of silphium
From Latin silphium, from Ancient Greek σίλφιον (sílphion).
Questions about silphium
- What does silphium mean?
- Silphium means a plant, thought to be extinct, used in Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome in cooking and as a contraceptive.
- What part of speech is silphium?
- Silphium is a noun.
- What is the plural of silphium?
- The plural of silphium is silphiums.
Words near silphium in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: silphium (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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Cite this entry: “silphium.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/silphium. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.