Page "Cedrus" Paragraph 21

Both the Latin words cedrus and the generic name cedrus are derived from the Greek ' kedros '.

Ancient Greek and Latin used the same word, kedros and cedrus respectively, for different species of plants now classified in the genera Cedrus and Juniperus ( juniper ).

Species of both genera are native to the area where Greek language and culture originated, though as the word " kedros " does not seem to be derived from any of the languages of the Middle East, it has been suggested the word may originally have applied to Greek species of juniper and was later adopted for species now classified in the genus Cedrus because of the similarity of their aromatic woods.

The name was similarly applied to citron and the word citrus is derived from the same root.

However, as a loan word in English, cedar had become fixed to its biblical sense of Cedrus by the time of its first recorded usage in AD 1000.