fructify
Etymology

Borrowed into Middle English from Old French fructefier.

Pronunciation
  • IPA: /ˈfɹʌktɪfaɪ/
Verb

fructify (fructifies, present participle fructifying; simple past and past participle fructified)

  1. (intransitive) To bear fruit; to generate useful products or ideas.
    • 1634, T[homas] H[erbert], “Mohelia, Its Description”, in A Relation of Some Yeares Trauaile, Begunne Anno 1626. into Afrique and the Greater Asia, […], London: […] William Stansby, and Jacob Bloome, →OCLC ↗, page 24 ↗:
      Atop the [Palmito] tree is a pith, in taſte better then Cabbage; and eating it takes avvay the future benefit of grovvth or fructifying, theſe and the Date-tree thriue not, except the male and female be vnited, and haue copulation: the ſhe is only fruitfull.
      A noun use.
  2. (transitive) To make productive or fruitful.
Translations


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