Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Botany Stalkless and attached directly at the base: sessile leaves.
- adj. Zoology Permanently attached or fixed; not free-moving: a sessile barnacle.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- In botany, attached without any sensible projecting support; sitting directly on the body to which it belongs without a support; attached by the base: as, a sessile leaf, one issuing directly from the main stem or branch without a petiole or footstalk; a sessile flower, one having no peduncle; a sessile stigma, one without a style, as in the poppy.
- In zoöl. and anatomy:
- Seated flat or low; fixed by a broad base; not stalked or pedunculated.
- Fixed; not free; sedentary.
- Specifically, in Crustacea: Having no peduncle, as a cirriped; belonging to the Sessilia. Having no stalk or ophthalmite, as an eye.
- In conchology, having no stalk or ommatophore, as an eye.
- In entomology, not petiolate, as an abdomen.
- In Hydroida, not detachable or separable, as a gonophore.
Wiktionary
- adj. zoology permanently attached to a substrate; not free to move about; “an attached oyster”
- adj. botany attached directly by the base; not having an intervening stalk.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Attached without any sensible projecting support.
- adj. (Bot.) Resting directly upon the main stem or branch, without a petiole or footstalk.
- adj. (Zoöl.) Permanently attached; -- said of the gonophores of certain hydroids which never became detached.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. attached directly by the base; not having an intervening stalk
- adj. permanently attached to a substrate; not free to move about
Etymologies
- From New Latin sessīlis ("sitting"), from sessus, perfect passive participle of verb sedēre ("sit"), + adjective suffix -īlis. Compare session. (Wiktionary)
- Latin sessilis, low, of sitting, from sessus, past participle of sedēre, to sit. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“The ganglia had already finished migrating to three new positions, repeating the same spherical configuration each time, before Richard recognized that what was growing in the sessile was a manna melon.”
“Perhaps, Richard mused, the sessile is a recording device only, and is incapable of imagination.”
“They may be sessile, that is, the cup rests immediately on the ground or wood, or leaves, or they may possess a short, or rather long stalk.”
Studies of American Fungi. Mushrooms, Edible, Poisonous, etc.
“From these lateral stemmed species there is an easy transition to the stemless forms which are sessile, that is, the shelving forms where the pileus is itself attached to the trunk, or other object of support on which it grows.”
Studies of American Fungi. Mushrooms, Edible, Poisonous, etc.
“The term _sessilifolius_ has been given to this species of Cytisus, because the leaves are for the most part sessile, that is sit close to the branches, without any or very short footstalks; such they are at least on the flowering branches when the shrub is in blossom, but at the close of the summer they are no longer so, the leaves acquiring very evident footstalks.”
“Serrated colorectal polyps include the subgroups hyperplastic polyps, sessile serrated polyps (also called sessile serrated adenomas), and serrated adenomas.”
“That alien face - it supposely has a "sessile" compound eye, by which it is meant - not on a stalk.”
“Many ponds are seasonal, lasting just a couple of months (such as sessile pools) while lakes may exist for hundreds of years or more.”
“Clover is a pair of leaves; the blossom is said to be "sessile" or seated on these leaves.”
“Do legislators imagine that pedophiles are sessile creatures, like sea anemones or Venus fly-traps, and have to wait passively for their victims to come withreach?”
The Volokh Conspiracy » Where, According to Tort Law, Should Accused Criminals and Ex-Convicts Live?
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘sessile’.
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Mycology
basidiomycete, initiation, fungus, shiitake, inoculum, substrate, fruit body, mycelium, hyphal growth, oyster, spawn run, polypore and 207 more...
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A Galimafrée of Plant Anatomy & Morph...
A hodgepodge, jumble, jambalaya, *gallimaufry, circus and tent revival of plant anatomy and morphology terms and phrases - its a big tent, and no tickets are required.
*array, collecti...naked bud, leaf blade, brochidodromous, serrate, cork cambium, rhizomatous, flower stalk, deciduous sepal, petal, whorl, nectar gland, stamen and 1348 more...
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250 Spelling Words
A selected sampling of words for intermediate and advanced spellers.
orecchiette, rhabdomancy, guayabera, orthoepy, opisthenar, maguey, proem, ciabatta, cioppino, banns, concinnity, asthenia and 237 more...
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phrontistery-s
from phrontistery.info
sabaton, sabbatarian, sabbulonarium, sabelline, sabin, sable, sabliere, sabot, sabretache, sabulous, saburration, saccade and 1593 more...
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Logolepsy
"Luciferous Logolepsy is a collection of over 9,000 obscure English words. Though the definition of an 'English' word might seem to be straightforward, it is not. There exist so many adopted, deriv...
Anschauung, Areopagus, Argus, Briarean, Dei gratia, Dei judicium, Deo volente, Duecento, Foehn, Geflugelte Worte, Gegenschein, Hakenkreuz and 9230 more...
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Specifically
Being a list of words which have "specifically" in their definitions.
recompose, specifically, Dutch, abstinence, discipline, virtue, namely, opening, century, amalgamation, cup, second and 303 more...
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Words I Don't Get to Use Enough
meretricious, languorous, inartful, caesura, truculent, hipsteratti, hiccius doccius, replevined, impudent, sessile, katabasis, pawl and 11 more...
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♥
ambrosia, inamorata, gossamer, lily-white, hummingbird, roucoulement, poppy, daisy, calypso, lunula, lamb, dove and 1526 more...
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kalidas's Words
crepuscular, mellifluous, ephemeral, diaphanous, zeitgeist, geisterfahrer, infinite, eternal, idyllic, azure, reminiscent, oblivion and 521 more...
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The Sog Collection
My big word list.
chaos, flaccid, empirical, flotsam, cacophony, grumble, assuage, awe, romance, mortality, coalesce, fortuitous and 3282 more...
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tree's Words
aphasia, anhedonia, promontory, misandry, amanuensis, asymptote, penultimate, muslin, tundra, calico, kinaesthesia, rutabaga and 209 more...
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billfence's Words
quotidian, flux, sawbuck, horsefeathers, chalcedony, harp, no, fox, tennis, badminton, flue, charm and 186 more...
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snarkout's Words
agenbite, scandent, vulpine, ratel, corvid, magpie, meline, musteline, ecdysiast, waxwing, abecedarian, guillotine and 111 more...
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ktrey's wordlist
Words that I like.
Many may be lexicographically impotent due to a lack of citations and definition. Hopefully I'll be able to rectify this eventually.velleity, dispositive, bloviate, bibulous, fungible, concupiscence, avuncular, carnaptious, thrawn, hypocoristic, diegesis, lagniappe and 928 more...
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azd's Words
adamantine, abatial, ablate, ablative, abrogate, accretive, acromegaly, acrostic, actinism, actinic, acuity, adduce and 968 more...
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misc. plant morphology
the concise british flora in colour (w. keble martin) - glossary - edited, and to be added to
whorled, viviparous, vittae, viscid, villous, valvate, unarmed, umbellate, umbel, tubercle, triquetrous, trigonous and 135 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for sessile.
knitandpurl "Sessile oak, beech and silver birch crowd around the sandy track, the sunlight twinkles from between the interlocking boughs, the little boys cavort, the adolescents even begin to frolic a bit."
Psychogeography by Will Self, 154
Note that the Sessile Oak is a thing unto itself, but in the course of looking it up I looked up the general meaning of "sessile" too. Oct 17, 2010
zeus Oxford University Press
adj. (Biology) permanently attached to a substrate; not free to move about: “an attached oyster”: sesile marine animals and plants”
monocytes, like all blood cells, are born in the bone marrow and at some point migrate to the spleen, lured by cues yet to be identified. They sit and wait, a sessile bunch, but when aroused by such chemical signatures of damage as angiotensin, the cells surge forth without hesitation
Aug 4, 2009