frangipani

English

Partly red frangipani flowers
One of many garden varieties of frangipani

Etymology

From an Italian noble family, a sixteenth-century marquess who invented a plumeria-scented perfume. The name comes from frangi "breaking" + pani "bread," a reference to the family's distribution of bread in time of famine.

Noun

frangipani (plural frangipanis)

  1. Any of several tropical American trees, of the genus Plumeria, having fragrant, showy, funnel-shaped flowers of a wide range of colours from creamy to red.
  2. A perfume originally obtained from these flowers

See also

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