''ginseng'' ▫ᴱᴺ Entries

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''ginseng'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260125204041-00-⌔

ginseng - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

🖼️ ➺ 🖼️ ➺

Noun

ginseng (countable and uncountable, plural ginsengs)

• Any plant of two species of the genus Panax (Panax ginseng and Panax quinquefolius), having forked roots supposed to have medicinal and aphrodisiac properties.
• The root of such a plant, or an extract of these roots.
  • ✤ When the Afghan princes find it necessary to employ Chob-Chini, (the Jin-seng, or China root so celebrated as a purifier, tonic, and aphrodisiac) they choose the spring season.¹
  • ✤ Athletes’use of herbal supplements has skyrocketed in the past two decades. At the top of the list of popular herbs are echinacea and ginseng, whereas garlic, St. John’s wort, soybean, ephedra and others are also surging in popularity or have been historically prevalent.²

Etymology

Borrowed from Hokkien 人參/人参 (jîn-sim, “ginseng”). Doublet of ninzin.

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ˈd͡ʒɪnsɛŋ/, [ˈd͡ʒɪnsɛŋ]
  • Audio (Southern England): 🔊
• (pin–pen merger)
  • (Southern US) IPA: /ˈd͡ʒɪnsɪŋ/, [ˈd͡ʒɪnsɪ̟ŋ]
• (Appalachia, African-American Vernacular, thank-think merger)
  • (without æ-raising) IPA: /ˈd͡ʒɪnsæŋ/, [ˈd͡ʒɪnsæŋ]
  • (æ-raising) IPA: /ˈd͡ʒɪnseɪ̯ŋ/, [ˈd͡ʒɪnseɪ̯ŋ]; /ˈd͡ʒɪnsɛ̃ŋ/, [ˈd͡ʒɪnsɛ̃ŋ]
• Rhymes: -ɪnsɛŋ
• Hyphenation: gin‧seng

Printed 2026-06-28.

(echo:: @ ⌗)

Footnotes

1. 1855, Sir Richard Burton, Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Al-Madinah & Meccah, Dover, published 1964, pages 56–7: ↩

2. 2013 March, David S. Senchina, “Athletics and Herbal Supplements”, in American Scientist ‎${}^{[1]}$, volume 101, number 2, archived from the original on 16 May 2013, page 134: ↩

Link to original

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