metasequoia

[ met-uh-si-kwoi-uh ]

noun

1. dawn redwood ( def ).

Word History and Origins

Origin of metasequoia¹

First recorded in 1940–45; from New Latin; the genus name; meta-, sequoia

Example Sentences

The 12-by-20-square-foot space was outfitted last summer with roughly 140 plants representative of the late Cretaceous: spiky palms, feathery metasequoia, frilly ferns.

From Los Angeles Times

Plant fossils may include ancestors of modern-day maples, oaks, alder, sycamore and metasequoia, a kind of pine tree.

From Seattle Times

Fossil plants from a metasequoia — an ancient coniferous tree, similar to the giant redwoods that grow in California today — indicate giant trees lined these beaches.

From Washington Post

It is home to gardens of oaks, mountain ashes, Asiatic maples, metasequoia and larches, as well as the country’s largest public collection of Japanese maples.

From Seattle Times

The metasequoia, or dawn redwood, entered a sort of plant limbo in the darkness, neither growing nor showing visible signs of decline.

From Los Angeles Times