Perennial Meaning

/pəˈɹɛn.ɪ.əl/
B2

Definition, CEFR level B2, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.

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adjLasting or remaining active throughout the year, for multiple years, or all the time.

adjContinuing without cessation or intermission for several years, or for an undetermined or infinite period; never-ending or never failing; perpetual, unceasing.

This gladiolus is perennial: it flowers every year without needing any special attention.
My country has beautiful beaches, lush nature and a perennial spring climate.
Synonyms:
Antonyms:
CEFR Practice Quiz
The ____ flowers in my garden come back every spring without replanting.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The garden was filled with ____ plants that returned every spring without needing to be replanted.

The adjective is borrowed from Latin perennis (“lasting through the whole year or for several years, perennial; continual, everlasting, perpetual”) + English -al (suffix meaning ‘of or pertaining to’ forming adjectives). Perennis is derived from per- (“completive or intensifying prefix with the sense of doing something all the way through or entirely”) + annus (“year; season, time”) (possibly ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₂et- (“to go”)). By surface analysis, per- + -ennial. The noun is derived from the adjective. Cognates * Middle French pérenne (modern French pérenne (“lasting through the whole year, perennial”)) * Italian perenne (“lasting for a long time”) * Spanish perenne (“eternal; permanent; a perennial plant”)

"[W]hat is most admirable is the vast enclosure, and variety of ground, in yᵉ large garden, containing vineyards, cornefields, meadows, groves (whereof one is of perennial greens), and walkes of vast lengthes, so accurately kept and cultivated, that nothing can be more agreeable." — 1644 March 7 (Gregorian calendar), John Evelyn, “[Diary entry for 27 February 1644]”, in William Bray, editor, Memoirs, Illustrative of the Life and Writings of John Evelyn, […], 2nd edition, volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […]; and sold by John and Arthur Arch, […], published 1819, →OCLC, page 43:
"And there is ſuch a thing as Subterraneous Heat, […] [a]s is manifeſt from the ſmoking of perennial Fountains in froſty VVeather, and VVater dravvn out of Pumps and open VVells." — 1713, W[illiam] Derham, “[A Survey of the Terraqueous Globe.] The Distribution of the Earth and Waters.”, in Physico-Theology: Or, A Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God, from His Works of Creation. […], London: […] W[illiam] Innys, […], →OCLC, book II (Of the Terraqueous Globe It Self, in General), footnote 3, pages 49–50:
"It [the pond] is a clear and deep green well, half a mile long and a mile and three quarters in circumference, and contains about sixty-one and a half acres; a perennial spring in the midst of pine and oak woods, without any visible inlet or outlet except by the clouds and evaporation." — 1854 August 9, Henry D[avid] Thoreau, “The Ponds”, in Walden; or, Life in the Woods, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor and Fields, →OCLC, page 191:
"That desert's age the gorge may prove, / Piercing profound the mountain bare; / Yet hardly churned out in the groove / By a perennial wear and tear / Of floods; nay, dry it shows within; / But twice a year the waters flow, / Nor then in tide, but dribbling thin: […]" — 1876, Herman Melville, “Canto I. In the Mountain.”, in Clarel: A Poem and Pilgrimage in the Holy Land. […], volume II, New York, N.Y.: G[eorge] P[almer] Putnam’s Sons […], →OCLC, part III (Mar Saba), page 306:
"These offshore Sonoman mountains likely formed an orogenic (mountainous) barrier to moisture inland, resulting in a mountain-shadow onshore desert punctuated by regional annual and large basin perennial streams draining into a forearc saline sea." — 2012, Chinle Miller, “The Tectonic Forces of the Mesozoic”, in In Mesozoic Lands: The Mesozoic Geology of Arches and Canyonlands National Parks, Kindle edition, page 34:

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CEFR Practice Quiz
The ____ flowers in my garden come back every spring without replanting.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The garden was filled with ____ plants that returned every spring without needing to be replanted.

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