cinquefoil

Estimated CEFR level: C2 — Proficiency

Estimated from word frequency; not an official CEFR classification.

Definition

noun any of a numerous plants grown for their five-petaled flowers; abundant in temperate regions; alleged to have medicinal properties
noun an ornamental carving consisting of five arcs arranged in a circle

From Old French cinqfoil, from cinq (“five”) + foil (“leaf”).

Lying beside a bank of silvery cinquefoil against a clear evening sky, where the planet Venus is a point of new and warmer light, one has the vision of her. — The Amazing Marriage — Complete, George Meredith
This was my curious labor all summer,—to make this portion of the earth’s surface, which had yielded only cinquefoil, blackberries, johnswort, and the like, before, sweet wild fruits and pleasant flowers, produce instead this pulse. — Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience, Henry David Thoreau
One day Haidee brought home some long, fragile trails of cinquefoil, one of the first spring things, and Val, worn and haggard under her blue veil, pinned it over her heart because she had read in old Elizabethan days that cinquefoil was supposed to be a cure for inflammations and fevers. — Wanderfoot (The Dream Ship), Cynthia Stockley

five-finger

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