deadly nightshade

Questions about deadly nightshade

What does deadly nightshade mean?

deadly nightshade means "perennial Eurasian herb with reddish bell-shaped flowers and shining black berries; extensively grown in United States; roots and leaves yield atropine". That is the primary sense; the word has 2 in total, listed in full on this page.

What is another word for deadly nightshade?

Close synonyms include belladonna, belladonna plant, Atropa belladonna, bittersweet, bittersweet nightshade. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is deadly nightshade a common word?

deadly nightshade is banded "Rare" — specialist or archaic — most readers will not have met it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.