Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Land covered with grassy turf.
- n. A lawn or meadow.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A skin; a covering; especially, the hide of a beast, as of a hog.
- n. The grassy surface of land; turf; that part of the soil which is filled with the roots of grass, forming a kind of mat. When covered with green grass it is called greensward.
- To produce sward on; cover with sward.
- To become covered with sward.
Wiktionary
- n. A layer of earth into which grass has grown; turf; sod.
- n. An expanse of land covered in grass; a lawn or meadow.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. Skin; covering.
- n. The grassy surface of land; that part of the soil which is filled with the roots of grass; turf.
- v. To produce sward upon; to cover, or be covered, with sward.
WordNet 3.0
- n. surface layer of ground containing a mat of grass and grass roots
Etymologies
- Middle English, from Old English sweard, skin.
Examples
“To the left of the sward is the fort, enclosed within which are the post-office and Government offices.”
Insulinde: Experiences of a Naturalist's Wife in the Eastern Archipelago
“On the sward is the village well, where there seems always to be a group of busy washers; and in the centre is a large school, where every educational advantage may be enjoyed, so that”
Insulinde: Experiences of a Naturalist's Wife in the Eastern Archipelago
“Here, where the sward is smooth and the space yet broad between, two converging lines of peaks are already arrayed before our eyes – one extending nearly due East and West; the other running up from the South-East to meet it.”
“A few dwarf birches unfold their leaves amid the rocks; a few sub-arctic willows hang out their catkins beside the swampy runnels; the golden potentilla opens its bright flowers on slopes where the evergreen _Empetrum nigrum_ slowly ripens its glossy crow-berries; and from where the sea-spray dashes at full tide along the beach, to where the snow gleams at midsummer on the mountain-summits, the thin short sward is dotted by the minute cruciform stars of the scurvy-grass, and the crimson blossoms of the sea-pink.”
“Kirkyards o 'their sward were a' howkit fu 'clean;”
The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. The Songs of Scotland of the past half century
“The sward was the brilliantly green, luxuriant wild growth that in these islands covers every foot of earth surface.”
“The moonlight on the lawn was tremulous, as if the sward were a rippling sea.”
“The sward is the original sward, untouched, unploughed, centuries old.”
“In the centre of the sward was a small artificial lake, long since dried up, and adorned then with a profusion of fountains, that seemed to scatter coolness around the glowing air.”
“It simply consisted of a few sticks laid up against the side of a ditch; over these sticks were thrown a few scraws -- that is, the sward of the earth cut thin; in the inside was the remnant of some loose straw, the greater part having been taken away either for bedding or firing.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘sward’.
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Archaic
abide, abjure, abroad, adamant, afield, aforetime, aghast, anon, apace, argent, assuage, aught and 327 more...
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Ancient Influence
Words that inspire a feeling of old and/or mythical influences.
Ogham, sward, willow, hazel, yew, holly, barrow, runes, sepulchre, rill, rivulet, heft and 18 more...
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Words I like
A list contrived for the sole purpose of storing words I like to include in my writing; words that inspire or carry power for me.
contrite, meadow, sward, ossary, calumny, moribund, necropolis, chthonic, murmur, erstwhile, chime, beryl and 29 more...
brtom "... as they run slowly forward over the sward or collide and stop, one by its fellow, with a brief alert shock."
Joyce, Ulysses, 14 Jan 27, 2007