prune1
/pruːn
/noun
1A plum preserved by drying and having a black, wrinkled appearance.However, just as raisins seem different from grapes, so do prunes appear to be distinct from plums....
- Sneak some raisins or puréed prunes or zucchini into whole-wheat pancakes.
- European plums have a thick, firm flesh that make excellent prunes, preserves, or desert fruit.
2 informal An unpleasant or disagreeable person: he was a good leader, but a right miserable old prune...
- Even pathetic old prunes have their moment in the glare of the gossip mags
- McGregor has some good company: that miserable old prune Hugh Morgan (another complete AO) is also a distinguished fellow.
- I had to put up with all these melodramatic old prunes (not just older people, but people of my own age as well) saying that my life was over, and oh, i would never be able to do my degree and get a good job, and oh, it is such a shame!
Origin
Middle English: from Old French, via Latin from Greek prou(m)non 'plum'.
plum from Old English:
Latin prunum is the source of both plum and prune (Late Middle English), a plum preserved by drying. The change from pr- to pl- is not an unusual one. The ‘l’ and ‘r’ are made in very similar parts of the mouth, and some languages do not distinguish between the two sounds. Plum pudding (mid 17th century) was originally made with plums. The use of plum to refer to something highly desirable, ‘the pick of the bunch’, probably arose from the idea of picking the tastiest bits out of a plum pudding. Upper-class people are sometimes said to have a plum in the mouth, or to speak with a plummy voice. The idea of having a plum in the mouth goes right back to the 1530s, though at first it meant that the speech was indistinct rather than posh.
Rhymes
prune2
/pruːn/verb [with object]
1Trim (a tree, shrub, or bush) by cutting away dead or overgrown branches or stems, especially to encourage growth: now is the time to prune roses [no object]: to limit growth, prune in summer...
- Late February is an optimum time to prune trees and shrubs in your landscape.
- When cleaning out the dead debris from flowerbeds, also prune any shrubs and push plants back into the soil that have heaved with the frosts.
- I pruned the rose bushes and gave them a good soaking - it has been a dry winter.
Synonyms
cut back, trim, thin, thin out, pinch back, crop, clip, shear, pollard, top, dock;
shape, even up, neaten, tidy (up)
1.1Cut away (a branch or stem) from a tree, shrub, etc. prune back the branches...
- You may also need to prune back live branches that are getting out of control.
- More compact plants result when long branches are pruned back to their junction at a lateral branch during early spring.
- But if you prune back hard or after the tree leafs out in spring, it may be slower to come into bloom that year.
Synonyms
cut off, lop (off), chop off, hack off, clip, snip (off), nip off, dock, sever, detach, remove
1.2Reduce the extent of (something) by removing superfluous or unwanted parts: the workforce was pruned...
- So unless top-line targets are met, the cost base is pruned to compensate.
- Acting quickly, Bern closed underperforming stores, pruned the work force, expanded product lines and revised the merchandising strategy.
- The coalition will be working very hard over the next few months to prune expenditure to bring down this tax rise. The process has already started.
Synonyms
reduce, cut, cut back, cut down, cut back on, pare, pare down, slim down, make reductions in, make cutbacks in, trim, whittle away/down, salami-slice, decrease, diminish, axe, shrink, minimize;
eliminate, get rid of, do away with
informal slash
1.3Remove (superfluous or unwanted parts) from something: Eliot deliberately pruned away details...
- And several bright ideas scattered here and there that never quite worked have been pruned away.
- Costs were cut, younger managers encouraged and deadwood pruned away with early retirement.
noun [in singular]
An instance of trimming a tree, shrub, or bush: they need little care other than an annual prune...
- As the weather starts to warm and spring is just around the corner, roses, and shrubs may need a prune.
- Unless he can find someone to lease them very soon he will give the trees a minimal prune and basic spray programme to grow apples for processing next season.
- These are usually the more delicate plants such as Clematis viticella, which are best with an annual light prune followed by hard pruning every ten years.
Derivatives
pruner
- On shrubs with many crowded shoots, use loppers or hand pruners to cut about a third of the oldest shoots back to the ground at the right time of year for pruning a particular shrub.
- If you just want to thin the growth, you can remove branches using your pruners or loppers by cutting the branch back to a fork.
- For branches too large to be cut with a hand pruner or lopping shears, pruning saws must be used.
Origin
Late 15th century (in the sense 'abbreviate'): from Old French pro(o)ignier, possibly based on Latin rotundus 'round'.