quassia Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. noun a bitter compound used as an insecticide and tonic and vermifuge; extracted from the wood and bark of trees of the genera Quassia and Picrasma
  2. noun handsome South American shrub or small tree having bright scarlet flowers and yielding a valuable fine-grained yellowish wood; yields the bitter drug quassia from its wood and bark
    Quassia amara; bitterwood.

WordNet

Quas"si*a noun
Etymology
NL. From the name of a negro, Quassy, or Quash, who prescribed this article as a specific.
Definitions
  1. The wood of several tropical American trees of the order Simarubeæ, as Quassia amara, Picræna excelsa, and Simaruba amara. It is intensely bitter, and is used in medicine and sometimes as a substitute for hops in making beer.

Webster 1913