type of leguminous plant, the dried roots of which were anciently used as a medicine and as a sweet, also liquorice, c. 1200, licoriz, from Anglo-French lycoryc, Old French licorece (also recolice), from Late Latin liquiritia, alteration of Latin glychyrrhiza, from Greek glykyrrhiza, literally "sweet root," from glykys "sweet" (see gluco-) + rhiza "root" (from PIE root *wrād- "branch, root"); form influenced in Latin by liquere "become fluid," because of the method of extracting the sweet stuff from the root. French réglisse, Italian regolizia are the same word, with metathesis of -l- and -r-.