heartwood

/ˈhɑɹtˌwʊd/

Etymology

From heart + wood.

heartwood means The wood nearer the heart of a stem or branch, different in color from the sapwood. Lexicurio rates it Rare gem — a strength score of 81 out of 100.

Why this word is great

HEARTWOOD — [Noun] The dense, often darker, nonliving inner wood of a tree trunk or branch, which provides structural support. From the English words 'heart' (referring to the central or innermost part) + 'wood' (the hard fibrous material from a tree). Unlike 'sapwood,' the living, aqueous conduit of seasonal purpose, or 'pith,' the soft, ephemeral infancy of the stem, heartwood is the tree's accumulated and abandoned archive. It is the deep amber column at the center of an ancient oak, the fragrant, rot-resistant heart of a cedar chest, and the dense, resonant block from which a luthier carves an instrument's soul—the steadfast architecture a life builds from what it has finished carrying.

noun

The wood nearer the heart of a stem or branch, different in color from the sapwood.“A popular myth is that heartwood is stronger than sapwood.”