sedge

English

a sedge of species Carex halleriana

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /sɛd͡ʒ/
  • Rhymes: -ɛdʒ
  • (file)

Etymology 1

From Middle English segge, from Old English seċġ, from Proto-West Germanic *sagi, from Proto-Germanic *sagjaz, from Proto-Indo-European *sak- (marsh plant).

Cognate with Dutch zegge and German Segge, dialectal German Saher (reeds).

Noun

sedge (countable and uncountable, plural sedges)

  1. Any plant of the genus Carex, the true sedge, perennial, endogenous herbs, often growing in dense tufts in marshy places. They have triangular jointless stems, a spiked inflorescence, and long grasslike leaves which are usually rough on the margins and midrib. There are several hundred species.
    • 1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter VIII, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:
      But when the moon rose and the breeze awakened, and the sedges stirred, and the cat's-paws raced across the moonlit ponds, and the far surf off Wonder Head intoned the hymn of the four winds, the trinity, earth and sky and water, became one thunderous symphony—a harmony of sound and colour silvered to a monochrome by the moon.
  2. Any plant of the family Cyperaceae.
  3. Any of certain other plants resembling sedges, such as Gentiana rubricaulis and Andropogon virginicus.
Derived terms
Translations

See also

Etymology 2

By contraction from sedge fly.

Noun

sedge (plural sedges)

  1. (fishing) A dry fly used in fly fishing, designed to resemble a sedge or caddis fly.

Etymology 3

Variant spellings.

Noun

sedge (plural sedges)

  1. Obsolete spelling of siege
  2. A flock of herons, cranes, or bitterns.

References

  • sedge”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

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