Also cowry, -ie, cowdi(e, kourie, kowrie. [Maori kauri, in Lee’s New Zeal. Vocab. (1820), written kaudi, r and d interchanging in Maori.]
A tall coniferous tree of New Zealand (Agathis or Dammara australis), which furnishes valuable timber and a resin known as kauri-gum.
1823. R. A. Cruise, Ten Months New Zeal., 145 (Morris). The banks of the river were found to abound with cowry.
1835. W. Yate, Acc. New Zeal., 37 (ibid.). As a shrub … the kauri is not very graceful.
1852. Mundy, Our Antipodes (1857), 128. Thirteen fine young Kauris varying in girth from that of a quarter cask to a hogshead.
1883. Renwick, Betrayed, 47. As some tall Kauri soars in lonely pride.
b. attrib. and Comb., as kauri bush, forest, pine, spar, trade, tree, wood: also kauri-gum, -resin, the fossil resin of kauri, used as a varnish (cf. DAMMAR); obtained in quantities by digging where the trees have formerly grown.
[1851. Illustr. Catal. Gt. Exhib., 204. Gum kauri, or Australian copal.]
1852. Mundy, Our Antipodes (1857), 127. A forest of the Kauri pine, the pride of the New Zealand Sylva. Ibid., 185. Intending to touch in that country to get Kauri spars.
1858. Simmonds, Dict. Trade, 111/2. From the fossil deposits … the kowrie resin of commerce is obtained.
1867. Hochstetter, New Zealand, 148. The Kauri pine yields … a second very valuable product, the Kauri gum.
1875. Ure, Dict. Arts, III. 25. Kourie wood … It is also called cowdie and kaurie wood.
