Obs. [App. OE. clufðung(e fem.; ME. clofthounk and cloffynnge are the same word. Bosw.-Toller explains from clufu clove, bulb + þung masc. monkshood or hellebore. Cf. CLOVE-TONGUE.] A plant: see quots.
(Cockayne understood the OE. name to mean Ranunculus sceleratus; which is probable, since both clufþung and clufwyrt are glossed by Batrachion, an old name of Ranunculus. But the ME. name seems to mean a hellebore, as in Halliwell’s modern entry.)
c. 1000. Sax. Leechd., I. 98. Ðeos wyrt þe man sceleratam, and oðrum naman clufþunge nemnað … bið cenned on fuhtum and on wætereʓum stowum.
c. 1050. Voc., in Wr.-Wülcker, 295/35. Botracion, clufðung.
a. 1450. Alphita (Anecd. Oxon.), 189. Vellatrum [? for veratrum, ‘hellebore’] Angl. clofthounk.
14[?]. MS. version of Macer, in Promp. Parv., s.v. Gladone, Do take … þe iij part of þe poudre of ellebre, þat some men clepen cloffynnge.
1847–78. Halliwell, Cloffing, the plant hellebore.
