Also 6–7 Salomon’s seal(e. [trans. med.L. sigillum Solomōnis (Salo-, Salamōnis).
The name has been variously explained as referring to the markings seen on a transverse section of the root-stock, or to the round scars left on this by the decay of the stems, or to the use of the root ‘to seal and close up green wounds.’]
1. A plant, Polygonatum multiflorum, the stems of which bear on the upper part broad sessile leaves and drooping green and white flowers.
1543. Traheron, trans. Vigo’s Chirurg., 182 b/2. Of the rootes of salomons seale sodden after the same maner.
1578. Lyte, Dodoens, I. lxix. 102. White roote or Salomons seale is of two sortes.
1629. Parkinson, Kitchen Garden, I. vii. 472. Salomon’s seal, or (as some call it) Ladder to heauen.
1676. Phil. Trans., II. 629. There grow wild in the Woods, Plantane of all sorts, Yellow-Dock,… Solomons-seal [etc.].
1767. Abercrombie, Ev. Man his own Gardener (1803), 553. Now is also a proper time to … transplant the roots of … Solomon’s seal.
1785. Martyn, Rousseau’s Bot., xviii. (1794), 249. This species is distinguished from Solomon’s-seal … by the flowers growing on a scape or naked stalk.
1826. Miss Mitford, Village, Ser. II. (1863), 410. The pendent drops of the stately Solomon’s seal, which hang like waxen tassels under the full and regular leaves.
1857. A. Gray, First Lessons Bot. (1866), 42. Some rootstocks are marked with large round scars of a different sort, like those of the Solomon’s Seal.
1882. Proc. Berw. Nat. Club, IX. 462. Celandine and Solomon’s seal were cultivated alongside the houses that we passed.
2. Applied to various other plants (see quots.).
1760. J. Lee, Introd. Bot., App. 317. Solomon’s Seal, Pensylvanian, Uvularia.
1846–50. A. Wood, Class-bk. Bot., 552. Majanthemum…. Convallaria bifolia. Two-leaved Solomon’s Seal. Ibid., Smilacina…. Convallaria trifoliata. Three-leaved Solomon’s Seal.
1856. A. Gray, Man. Bot. (1859), 467. Smilacìna.… False Solomon’s Seal.
1898. Morris, Austral Eng., 426. Solomon’s Seal,… the Tasmanian name for Drymophila cyanocarpa,… also called Turquoise Berry.
