cocoa palm

CIDE DICTIONARY

cocoa palm, n. [Sp. & Pg. coco cocoanut, in Sp. also, cocoa palm. The Portuguese name is said to have been given from the monkeylike face at the base of the nut, fr. Pg. coco a bugbear, an ugly mask to frighten children. Cf., however, Gr. koy^ki the cocoa palm and its fruit, ko`i:x, ko`i:kos, a kind of Egyptian palm.].

 A tall palm tree producing the cocoanut (Cocos nucifera) as its fruit. It grows in nearly all tropical countries, attaining a height of sixty or eighty feet. The trunk is without branches, and has a tuft of leaves at the top, each being fifteen or twenty feet in length, and at the base of these the nuts hang in clusters; the cocoanut tree. It is widely planted throughout the tropics, and in some locations as an ornamental tree.  [1913 Webster]