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Dictionary of Phrase and Fable—W

Walnut

[foreign nut ]. It comes from Persia, and is so called to distinguish it from those native to Europe, as hazel, filbert, chestnut. (Anglo-Saxon, walh, foreign; hnutu, nut.)

“Some difficulty there is in cracking the name thereof. Why wallnuts, having no affinity to a wall, should be so called. The truth is, gual or wall in the old Dutch signifleth `strange' or texotic' (whence Welsh, foreigners); these nuts being no natives of England or Europe, but probably first fetched from Persia, and called by the French nux persique. ” — Fuller: Worthies of England.

Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894
Walnut Tree
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