laurel

noun

• 1any of a number of shrubs and other plants with dark green glossy leaves, in particular:

  • short for cherry laurel the bay tree.See bay²

• 2an aromatic evergreen shrub related to the bay tree, several kinds of which form forests in tropical and warm countries.

  • Family Lauraceae: many genera and species

• 3 (usually laurels) the foliage of the bay tree woven into a wreath or crown and worn on the head as an emblem of victory or mark of honour in classical times: figurativeMansell became only the seventh Briton to wear the champion’s laurels
• honour or praise for an achievement:she has rightly won laurels for this brilliantly perceptive first novel

verb (laurels, laurelling, laurelled; US laurels, laureling, laureled)

• honour by adorning with a laurel or presenting with an award: they banish our anger forever when they laurel the graves of our dead (as adjective laurelled or laureled)she is also one of science fiction’s most laureled writers