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brusque: brusque: [17] Brusque comes ultimately from the name of an unpleasant spiky shrub, the butcher’s broom, which instead of normal branches and leaves has twigs flattened into a leaflike shape, with at their ends stiff spines. The term for this in Vulgar Latin was *bruscum, which, passing into Italian as brusco, came to be used as an adjective, meaning ‘sharp, tart’. French borrowed it as brusque ‘lively, fierce’, and passed it on to English. It seems likely that English brisk [16] is derived from it.
=> brisk
viper: viper: [16] A viper is etymologically a creature that ‘gives birth to live young’. The word comes via Old French vipere from Latin vīpera ‘snake’. This was a contraction of an earlier *vīvipera, a compound noun formed from vīvus ‘alive’ (source of English vivacious, vivid, etc) and parere ‘give birth’ (source of English parent, parturition, etc) – in former times it was thought that snakes gave birth to live young.

Latin vīpera is also the ancestor of English wyvern ‘dragonlike creature’ [17] and possibly of weever [17], the name of a type of fish with poisonous spines; and the elements from which it was formed also of course underlie the English adjective viviparous.
=> parent, vivid, viviparous
tang (n.): mid-14c., "serpent's tongue" (thought to be a stinging organ), later "sharp extension of a metal blade" (1680s), from a Scandinavian source akin to Old Norse tangi "spit of land; pointed end by which a blade is driven into a handle," from Proto-Germanic *tang-, from PIE *denk- "to bite" (see tongs). Influenced in some senses by tongue (n.). Figurative sense of "a sharp taste" is first recorded mid-15c.; that of "suggestion, trace" is from 1590s. The fish (1734) so called for their spines.
wispy (adj.): 1717, from wisp + -y (2). Related: Wispiness.
tragacanth: "A white or reddish plant gum, used in the food, textile, and pharmaceutical industries", Late 16th century: from French tragacante, via Latin from Greek tragakantha 'goat's thorn', from tragos 'goat' (because it is browsed by goats) + akantha 'thorn' (referring to the shrub's spines).
echinacea: "A North American plant of the daisy family, whose flowers have a raised cone-like centre which appears to consist of soft spines. It is used in herbal medicine, largely for its antibiotic and wound-healing properties", Modern Latin, from Greek ekhinos 'hedgehog'.
rambutan: "A red, plum-sized tropical fruit with soft spines and a slightly acidic taste", Early 18th century: from Malay rambūtan, from rambut 'hair', with allusion to the fruit's spines.
edaphosaurus: "A large herbivorous synapsid reptile of the late Carboniferous and early Permian periods, with long knobbly spines on its back supporting a sail-like crest", Modern Latin, from Greek edaphos 'floor' + sauros 'lizard'.
actinopterygian: "Of or relating to the group Actinopterygii of bony fishes characterized by membranous fins supported by slender rays or spines", Late 19th cent.; earliest use found in Edward Cope (1840–1897). From actino- + -pterygian, after scientific Latin Actinopterygii.