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buttercup

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buttercup

any of various yellow-flowered ranunculaceous plants of the genus Ranunculus, such as R. acris (meadow buttercup), which is native to Europe but common throughout North America
Collins Discovery Encyclopedia, 1st edition © HarperCollins Publishers 2005

buttercup

traditional symbol of wealth. [Plant Symbolism: Flora Symbolica, 167]
See: Wealth
Allusions—Cultural, Literary, Biblical, and Historical: A Thematic Dictionary. Copyright 2008 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.
The following article is from The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979). It might be outdated or ideologically biased.

Buttercup

 

the popular name for certain herbaceous plants, predominantly with yellow flowers. Plants of the genus Ranunculus, primarily the species Ranunculus acris, are most often called buttercups. R. acris is a perennial, measuring 20–80 cm. tall, with a hairy stem and generally digitipartite leaves. The flowers are golden-yellow, on long peduncles; they bloom at the beginning of the summer. R. acris grows in the temperate zone of Eurasia; in the USSR it is found in meadows, forest glades, brushwood, and forests in the European USSR, Western Siberia, and Middle Asia. It is poisonous: the juice produces severe burns on the skin and causes tearing and sharp pain in the eyes. The buttercup is a meadow weed, rarely eaten by cattle.

The Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 3rd Edition (1970-1979). © 2010 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.
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