prune

noun

1. (obsolete)A plum.
2. The dried, wrinkled fruit of certain species of plum.
3. (figuratively)Something wrinkly like a prune.

   “We are not free when we are in the grip of the false conditioning that decrees that we need sex. We are not free if we believe the culture's ominous warnings that we will become "horny" (what a callous, offensive word) and frustrated and neurotic and finally shrivel up into prunes and have to abandon hope of being good, creative, effective people.”

4. (slang)An old woman, especially a wrinkly one.

verb

1. (informal, intransitive)To become wrinkled like a dried plum, as the fingers and toes do when kept submerged in water.

   “I hardly left that spot in my pool that month even when my fingers pruned and chlorine dried out my skin.”

2. (transitive)To remove excess material from a tree or shrub; to trim, especially to make more healthy or productive.

   “A good grape grower will prune the vines once a year.”

   “But poore old man, thou prun'ſt a rotten tree, / That cannot ſo much as a bloſſome yeelde”

   “Our delightful task / To prune these growing plants, and tend these flowers.”

3. (figuratively, transitive)To cut down or shorten (by the removal of unnecessary material).

   “to prune a budget, or an essay”

   “taking into consideration how they [laws] are to be pruned and reformed”

4. (transitive)To remove (something unnecessary) for the sake of cutting down or shortening that which it was previously part of.

   “When internal dissension and a decline in popularity set in, Johnny was pruned from the Crests.”

5. (Internet, transitive)To remove participation status from or contributed material attributed to users usually deemed inactive or undesirable from an interactive computer service or website for the sake of housekeeping.
6. (transitive)To remove unnecessary branches from a tree data structure.
7. (obsolete)To trim the feathers with the beak.
8. (obsolete)To preen; to prepare; to dress.

   “She gins her feathers fowle disfigured Prowdly to prune, and sett on every side.”

   “For 'tis observed of every scribbling man, / He grows a fop as fast as e'er he can; / Prunes up, and asks his oracle, the glass, / If pink or purple best become his face.”