[witch ha.zel] n [witch, a tree with pliant branches, fr. ME wyche, fr. OE wice; prob. akin to OE wican to yield--more at weak] (ca. 1542) 1: any of a genus (Hamamelis of the family Hamamelidaceae, the witch-hazel family) of shrubs or small trees with slender-petaled yellow flowers borne in late fall or early spring; esp: one (H. virginiana) of eastern No. America that blooms in the fall
2: an alcoholic solution of a distillate of the bark of a witch hazel (H. virginiana) used as a soothing and mildly astringent lotion