leaf Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. noun the main organ of photosynthesis and transpiration in higher plants
    foliage; leafage.
  2. noun a sheet of any written or printed material (especially in a manuscript or book)
    folio.
  3. noun hinged or detachable flat section (as of a table or door)
  4. verb look through a book or other written material
    flick; thumb; flip; riff; riffle.
    • He thumbed through the report
    • She leafed through the volume
  5. verb turn over pages
    • leaf through a book
    • leaf a manuscript
  6. verb produce leaves, of plants

WordNet

Leaf noun
Etymology
OE. leef, lef, leaf, AS. leáf; akin to S. lf, OFries. laf, D. loof foliage, G. laub,OHG. loub leaf, foliage, Icel. lauf, Sw. löf, Dan. löv, Goth. laufs; cf. Lith. lapas. Cf. Lodge.
Wordforms
plural Leaves
Definitions
  1. (Bot.) A colored, usually green, expansion growing from the side of a stem or rootstock, in which the sap for the use of the plant is elaborated under the influence of light; one of the parts of a plant which collectively constitute its foliage. ✍ Such leaves usually consist of a blade, or lamina , supported upon a leafstalk or petiole, which, continued through the blade as the midrib, gives off woody ribs and veins that support the cellular texture. The petiole has usually some sort of an appendage on each side of its base, which is called the stipule. The green parenchyma of the leaf is covered with a thin epiderm pierced with closable microscopic openings, known as stomata.
  2. (Bot.) A special organ of vegetation in the form of a lateral outgrowth from the stem, whether appearing as a part of the foliage, or as a cotyledon, a scale, a bract, a spine, or a tendril. ✍ In this view every part of a plant, except the root and the stem, is either a leaf, or is composed of leaves more or less modified and transformed.
  3. Something which is like a leaf in being wide and thin and having a flat surface, or in being attached to a larger body by one edge or end; as : (a) A part of a book or folded sheet containing two pages upon its opposite sides. (b) A side, division, or part, that slides or is hinged, as of window shutters, folding doors, etc. (c) The movable side of a table. (d) A very thin plate; as, gold leaf. (e) A portion of fat lying in a separate fold or layer. (f) One of the teeth of a pinion, especially when small.
    They were both determined to turn over a new leaf. Richardson.
Leaf intransitive verb
Wordforms
imperfect & past participle Leafed ; present participle & verbal noun Leafing
Definitions
  1. To shoot out leaves; to produce leaves; to leave; as, the trees leaf in May. = leaf out Sir T. Browne.

Webster 1913