Lexic.us

Definition of Mescal bean

1. Noun. Shrub or small tree having pinnate leaves poisonous to livestock and dense racemes of intensely fragrant blue flowers and red beans.

Definition of Mescal bean

1. Noun. A genus (''Calia'') of three or four species of shrubs or small trees in the subfamily ''Faboideae'' of the pea family ''Fabaceae'', native to southwestern North America from western Texas to New Mexico and Arizona in the United States, and south through Chihuahua, Coahuila and Nuevo León in northern Mexico. ¹

¹ Source: wiktionary.com

Lexicographical Neighbors of Mescal Bean

Literary usage of Mescal bean

Below you will find example usage of this term as found in modern and/or classical literature:

1. Societies of the Plains Indians by Clark Wissler (1916)
"... the mescal bean, for this society teaches that all animal powers were learned through the power of the mescal bean. While the name of the society is ..."

2. The Indian Tribes of the Upper Mississippi Valley and Region of the Great Lakes by Emma Helen Blair, Nicolas Perrot, Morrell Marston, Thomas Forsyth, Paul Radin, Gertrude M. Robertson (1912)
"... is generally used, and its members call themselves by it, in their talk; but it is erroneous, as these people never used the mescal-bean in any form. ..."

3. Transactions of the Department of Archaeology, Free Museum of Science and Art by University of Pennsylvania, University Museum (1905)
"The use of the mescal bean and the ceremonies of the mescal worship have become quite general among them recently. About five years ago, I was informed, ..."

4. Frontier Missionary Problems: Their Character and Solution by Bruce Kinney (1918)
"This comes from the worship of the mescal bean which is the dried flower of a certain kind of cactus which grows in Mexico, and this religion has crept up ..."

5. Materials for the Physical Anthropology of the Eastern European Jews by Maurice Fishberg (1907)
"Recent religious influence, either from the Messiah belief or the " mescal bean " [peyote] brought more prayers, songs, and speeches into the religious life ..."

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