Weed

Pronunciation

• IPA: /wiːd/
• Rhymes: -iːd
• Homophones: we'd

From Old English wēod. Cognate with Dutch wied ("unwanted plant, weed").

Full definition of weed

Noun

1. A plant.
1. (countable) Any plant growing in cultivated ground to the injury of the crop or desired vegetation, or to the disfigurement of the place; an unsightly, useless, or injurious plant.
   If it isn't in a straight line or marked with a label, it's a weed.
• 1944, Miles Burton, The Three Corpse Trick Chapter 5, The hovel stood in the centre of what had once been a vegetable garden, but was now a patch of rank weeds. Surrounding this, almost like a zareba, was an irregular ring of gorse and brambles, an unclaimed vestige of the original common.
2. (countable) A species of plant considered harmful to the environment or regarded as a nuisance.
3. Short for duckweed.
4. (uncountable, archaic or obsolete) Underbrush; low shrubs.
• Edmund Spenser (c.1552–1599)one rushing forth out of the thickest weed
• Alfred Tennyson (1809-1892)A wild and wanton pard.../ Crouched fawning in the weed.
2. A drug or the like made from the leaves of a plant.
1. (uncountable, slang) Marijuana.
2. (obsolete, uncountable, slang) Tobacco.
3. (obsolete, countable) A cigar.
3. (obsolete, countable) A horse unfit to breed from.
4. (countable, British, informal) A puny person; one who has with little physical strength.
5. (countable, Scotland) A sudden illness or relapse, often attended with fever, which attacks women in childbed.
6. (countable, figuratively) Something unprofitable or troublesome; anything useless.

Synonyms

Derived terms

From Old English wēodian.

Verb

1. To remove unwanted vegetation from a cultivated area.I weeded my flower bed.

From Old English wǣd, from Proto-Germanic. Compare Dutch lijnwaad, gewaad.

Noun

1. (archaic) A garment or piece of clothing.
2. (archaic) Clothing collectively; clothes, dress.
• 1599, William Shakespeare, ,DON PEDRO. Come, let us hence, and put on other weeds;And then to Leonato's we will go.CLAUDIO. And Hymen now with luckier issue speed's,Than this for whom we rend'red up this woe!
• 1819, Walter Scott, IvanhoeThese two dignified persons were followed by their respective attendants, and at a more humble distance by their guide, whose figure had nothing more remarkable than it derived from the usual weeds of a pilgrim.
3. (archaic) An article of dress worn in token of grief; a mourning garment or badge.He wore a weed on his hat.
4. (archaic) widow's weeds: female mourning apparel
• MiltonIn a mourning weed, with ashes upon her head, and tears abundantly flowing.

From the verb wee.

Verb

1. weed

   (past of wee)