- 1
A pimpernel is a small wild plant. The famous kind is the scarlet pimpernel, with tiny five-petal flowers that are usually bright red, though you can also find blue or other colours. It grows low, often in fields and along paths, and the flowers have a habit of closing when rain is coming — old country talk treated that as a little weather sign. It is not a big garden show-flower; it is a modest wild thing. Students who read English stories may meet The Scarlet Pimpernel before they meet the plant: that is a famous hero's nickname, taken from this little red flower. The plant is the base meaning; the book is borrowing the name.
海綠（矮小野花，典型是硃紅色；小說《紅花俠》The Scarlet Pimpernel 也是借用這花名）
組成From Anglo-Norman and Middle French, from Medieval Latin pimpinella. Most likely from Latin piper (pepper), because the fruit looked a bit like peppercorns; some old spellings suggest a “two-winged” plant instead. Scholars do not all agree.
原始詞典資料6 筆記錄
以下是外部詞典記錄的用法，原文照列，我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的；有些用法可能上面已經講過了。
pimpernelnoun/ˈpɪmpənɛl/
- 1
archaicA plant of the genus Pimpinella, especially burnet saxifrage (Pimpinella saxifraga).
- 2
Any of various plants of the genus Anagallis, having small red, white or purple flowers, especially the scarlet pimpernel (Anagallis arvensis).
- Common Pimpernel has diverse weak square stalks lying on the ground, beset all along with two small and almost round leaves at every joint [...].
- Pimpernel (poor man's weather glass) was also a protection, but as the gatherer collected the herbs, he must chant a certain incantation and continue to do so twice a day for 15 days[.]
- 3
Sanguisorba spp.
- 4
Sanguisorba spp.
- 5
A yellow pimpernel (Taenidia integerrima)
- 6
Someone resembling the fictional Scarlet Pimpernel; a gallant dashing resourceful man given to remarkable feats of bravery and derring-do in liberating victims of tyranny and injustice.
- Lined up solidly with the Pimpernels and with the persecuted.
資料來源：英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary（CC BY-SA 4.0）。 原文照列，未經改寫。