cornflower

C2+ Topic:Plants & Agriculture

US /ˈkɔrnˌflaʊɚ/ UK /ˈkɔːnflaʊə/ See IPA manual

Meanings

1

noun
a blue-flowered plant that grows in cornfields; bachelor's button

A ribbon of cornflower blue ran along the edge of the wheat.

Thesaurus

Synonyms

1 noun · a blue-flowered plant that... bluebottlebachelor's buttoncentaury

Word family

Related forms corn flower

Etymology

A compound of 'corn' (grain) plus 'flower', so named because the plant grows as a weed among cereal crops. 'Corn' is from Old English 'corn' ('grain').

corn Old English

View etymology graph ->

Topics

Plants & Agriculture Word Formation & Derivatives

External links

# cornflower

**Type:** Word
**Level:** C2+
**Part of speech:** noun
**IPA (US):** /ˈkɔrnˌflaʊɚ/
**IPA (UK):** /ˈkɔːnflaʊə/

## Meanings
1. a blue-flowered plant that grows in cornfields; bachelor's button

## Examples
- A ribbon of cornflower blue ran along the edge of the wheat.

## Synonyms
- bluebottle
- bachelor's button
- centaury

## Related Forms
- corn
- flower

## Roots and Affixes
- Root: corn

## Etymology
A compound of 'corn' (grain) plus 'flower', so named because the plant grows as a weed among cereal crops. 'Corn' is from Old English 'corn' ('grain').

## AI Etymology
Cornflower is a compound of 'corn' (grain) plus 'flower', so named because the plant grows as a weed among cereal crops. 'Corn' is from Old English 'corn' ('grain'). The immediate etymological form is Old English corn. In present use as a noun, it means "a blue-flowered plant that grows in cornfields; bachelor's button", keeping the historical formation close to the word's ordinary semantic work. As a compound, its meaning is assembled from the two visible parts rather than from an opaque borrowing. Related words include corn and flower.

## Topics
- Plants & Agriculture
- Word Formation & Derivatives

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