Word.ws English Dictionary

tenacle

/ˈtɛnəkəl/

tenacle noun: a stalk or shoot by which a plant holds itself up, or by which climbing plants attach themselves to surfaces.

Noun

tenacle (plural tenacles)

  1. (rare) A stalk or shoot by which a plant holds itself up, or by which climbing plants attach themselves to surfaces.
    • And Ivy divided from the root, we have observed to live some years, by the cirrous parts commonly conceived but as tenacles and holdfasts unto it.1658, Sir Thomas Browne, The Garden of Cyrus, Folio Society, published 2007, page 198

Forms of tenacle

pluraltenacles

Origin of tenacle

From Latin tenaculum, from tenere (“to hold”).

Questions about tenacle

What does tenacle mean?
Tenacle means a stalk or shoot by which a plant holds itself up, or by which climbing plants attach themselves to surfaces.
What part of speech is tenacle?
Tenacle is a noun.
How do you pronounce tenacle?
Tenacle is pronounced /ˈtɛnəkəl/.
What is the plural of tenacle?
The plural of tenacle is tenacles.

Words near tenacle in the dictionary

  1. tenaciousness
  2. tenacissimoside
  3. tenacissoside
  4. tenacities
  5. tenacity
  6. tenacle
  7. tenacles
  8. tenacula
  9. tenacular
  10. tenaculum
  11. tenaculums

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: tenacle (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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