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Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
turnip
noun
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ Add mushrooms, carrot, turnip, and celery, and cook for 1 minute.
▪ By that sorcery, both turnips and lives are converted to money.
▪ By the time she got back, Spike had whittled his turnip just right.
▪ Five feet six, he was overweight for his height and his body resembled a large turnip in shape.
▪ The goats just ran around and nibbled on the turnips.
▪ The goats: They take advantage of an opportunity like a field of turnips.
▪ The only other forage crops grown were kale and turnips but these were not widespread.
▪ When old Aaron Tyson from Limestone Hill sold to the greengrocer's the turnips he'd stacked up for his sheep.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Turnip

Turnip \Tur"nip\, n. [OE. turnep; probably fr. turn, or F. tour a turn, turning lathe + OE. nepe a turnip, AS. n[=ae]pe, L. napus. Cf. Turn,v. t., Navew.] (Bot.) The edible, fleshy, roundish, or somewhat conical, root of a cruciferous plant ( Brassica campestris, var. Napus); also, the plant itself. [Formerly written also turnep.] Swedish turnip (Bot.), a kind of turnip. See Ruta-baga. Turnip flea (Zo["o]l.), a small flea-beetle ( Haltica, striolata syn. Phyllotreta striolata), which feeds upon the turnip, and often seriously injures it. It is black with a stripe of yellow on each elytron. The name is also applied to several other small insects which are injurious to turnips. See Illust. under Flea-beetle. Turnip fly. (Zo["o]l.)

  1. The turnip flea.

  2. A two-winged fly ( Anthomyia radicum) whose larv[ae] live in the turnip root.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
turnip

c.1500, turnepe, probably from turn (from its shape, as though turned on a lathe) + Middle English nepe "turnip," from Old English næp, from Latin napus "turnip." The modern form of the word emerged late 18c.

Wiktionary
turnip

n. 1 The white root of a yellow-flowered plant, ''Brassica rapa'', grown as a vegetable and as fodder for cattle. 2 (context Scotland Ireland Cornwall Atlantic Canada English) The yellow root of a related plant, the swede or ''Brassica napus''.

WordNet
turnip
  1. n. widely cultivated plant having a large fleshy edible white or yellow root [syn: white turnip, Brassica rapa]

  2. root of any of several members of the mustard family

Wikipedia
Turnip

The turnip or white turnip ( Brassica rapa subsp. rapa) is a root vegetable commonly grown in temperate climates worldwide for its white, bulbous taproot.

Small, tender varieties are grown for human consumption, while larger varieties are grown as feed for livestock.

In the north of England and Scotland, and eastern Canada ( Newfoundland), turnip (or neep; the word turnip is an old compound of tur- as in turned/rounded on a lathe and neep, derived from Latin napus) refers to the larger, yellow rutabaga root vegetable, also known as the "swede" (from "Swedish turnip").

Turnip (terminology)

Turnip can refer to three vegetables, which are described under the articles Turnip, Rutabaga, and Jicama. The confusion results from the following regional differences of usage.

Scientific term

Brassica rapa rapa

Brassica napus or B. napobrassica

Pachyrhizus

Southern England, most Commonwealth countries

turnip

swede (from "swedish turnip")

yam

Scotland, Ireland, the Isle of Man, and parts of Northern England

swede or white turnip

turnip, yellow turnip or "neep"

yam

Cornwall

white turnip

turnip

United States

turnip

rutabaga or yellow turnip

jicama

Malaysia, Singapore, and Philippines

turnip

also called

white turnip or summer turnip

yellow turnip or winter turnip

sweet turnip

Brassica napus and B. napobrassica are called swedes (a shortening of Swedish turnip) in England, especially in the South, and in most dialects of the Commonwealth. Rutabaga, from the Swedish rotabagga, for "root bag" is mostly used in North America, in the United States and Canada. The rutabaga or swede differs from the turnip (Brassica rapa) in that it is typically larger and yellow-orange rather than white.

However, in some dialects of British English the two vegetables have overlapping or reversed names. In the north of England and Scotland, the larger, yellow rutabagas are called neeps or turnips from folk etymology, while the smaller white turnips are called swedes.

Usage examples of "turnip".

The practice of yearly rotating crops from wheat to turnips to barley to clover and grass would seem to make sound economic as well as agronomic sense, which was undoubtedly why the previous Earl of Blackthorn had not deviated from the use of it.

I should want 200 tons of this for the mangels and turnips, and the 300 tons I should want to top-dress 20 acres of grass land intended for corn and potatoes the next year.

I fetched something like kale ravioli or turnip jam, and some eggs and cheese when I brought them a maccherone, and even good meat when I could sneak a bit of mortadella or pork jelly.

He smelled turnip greens and some kind of mustardy vegetable, and there was a faint cooking aroma of vinegar.

He trudged to Parramatta to pick up their weekly ration from the government store, dug turnips and potatoes in the garden plot, cut and carried firewood, and even, if he thought she was tired, relieved her of the thankless task of producing an edible meal from the often putrefying ration meat, which, in common with the rest of the community, they all found unpalatable.

While she spent an afternoon peeling turnips a phase or so ago for a hard-earned half crown, Pitta had mentioned their children were going north to visit their grandmother.

Six months later, all over the immense domain of the devil, one could see nothing but carrots, turnips, onions, salsify, all the plants whose juicy roots are good and savory and whose useless leaves are good for nothing but for feeding animals.

The vegetables segregated themselves by variety: All the carrots grouped together, and the onions, scallions, beets, sweet potatoes, radishes, turnips, and garlics.

I got three or four of the men to drive the wagon with me, and we went around the city sunwise, left to right, up and over, while he showed us every pass over the surrounding hills and hole through the stone escarpments while the turnips became almost hysterical with anticipation.

To the market gardener, or to a farmer who manures heavily common turnips drilled in with superphosphate will prove a valuable crop.

I cannot too earnestly recommend the use of superphosphate as a manure for turnips.

Swede turnips or ruta-bagas, it will usually be necessary, in order to secure a maximum crop, to use a manure which, in addition to superphosphate, contains available nitrogen.

I have said before, superphosphate, when drilled in with the seed, has a wonderful effect in developing the root-growth of the young plants of turnips, and I thought it would have the same effect on lettuce, cabbage, cauliflowers, etc.

Dishes came in an unceasing stream, soups and terrines followed by pigeon en daube, a rack of lamb, sallets and greens and a dish of white turnips whipped to a froth which everyone pronounced a delight of rustic sophistication, and all the while rivers of wine poured from chilled jugs into glasses only half-empty.

We spent two days during a severe storm of rain and sleet in a farm-barn where the slaves were so drunk on applejack that they had forgotten us and left us with nothing to eat but raw turnips.