Definition
nounAny plant of the family Poaceae, characterized by leaves that arise from nodes in the stem and leaf bases that wrap around the stem, especially those grown as ground cover rather than for grain.
nounAny of the various plants that are not in the family Poaceae that resemble grasses.
Sentence Examples
Kyoko is lying on the grass.
The cows were moving very slowly through the long green grass.
She was lying face downwards on the grass.
Word Origin & History
Etymology tree
Proto-Indo-European *gʰreh₁-der.
Proto-Germanic *grasą
Proto-West Germanic *gras
Old English græs
Middle English gras
English grass
Inherited from Middle English gras, from Old English græs, from Proto-West Germanic *gras, from Proto-Germanic *grasą (“grass”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰreh₁- (“to grow”).
Cognates
Cognate with Scots gress (“grass”), North Frisian gaars, geers, Gērs, gjars, gjas, gäärs (“grass”), Saterland Frisian Gäärs (“grass”), West Frisian gers (“grass”), Cimbrian gras, grass (“grass”), German and Luxembourgish Gras (“grass, weed”), Dutch gras (“grass, turf, pasture”), Mòcheno and Vilamovian gros (“grass”), West Flemish ges (“grass”), Yiddish גראָז (groz, “grass”), Danish græs (“grass”), Faroese, Icelandic, and Norwegian Nynorsk gras (“grass”), Norwegian Bokmål gras, gress (“grass”), Swedish gräs (“grass”), Gothic 𐌲𐍂𐌰𐍃 (gras, “herb”); also Latin herba (“plant, weed, grass”), Albanian grath (“grass blade, spike”). Related to grow, green.
The "informer" sense is probably a shortening of grasshopper (“police officer, informant”), rhyming slang for copper (“police officer”) or shopper (“informant”); the exact sequence of derivation is unclear.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"Thou turnest man to destruction: and sayest, Returne yee children of men. / For a thousand yeeres in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past: and as a watch in the night. / Thou carriest them away as with a flood, they are as a sleepe: in the morning they are like grasse which groweth vp. / In the morning it flourisheth, and groweth vp: in the euening it is cut downe, and withereth."
— 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Psalms 90:3–6:
"The cicale above in the lime, / And the lizards below in the grass, / Were as silent as ever old Tmolus was, / Listening to my sweet pipings."
— a. 1823 (date written), Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Hymn of Pan”, in Mary W[ollstonecraft] Shelley, editor, Posthumous Poems of Percy Bysshe Shelley, London: […] [C. H. Reynell] for John and Henry L[eigh] Hunt, […], published 1824, →OCLC, page 169:
"'Twas early June, the new grass was flourishing everywheres, the posies in the yard—peonies and such—in full bloom, the sun was shining, and the water of the bay was blue, with light green streaks where the shoal showed."
— 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter I, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y.; London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:
"Jojo left his home in Tucson, Arizona / For some California grass"
— 1970, Paul McCartney, “Get Back”, in Let It Be, performed by The Beatles:
"He was a grass and an arse lick and he didn't do it for him, he did it for his brother, because if Vaughan had hit him especially with his mallet, Mark was the kind of lowlife that would have pressed charges and then that's a whole different problem."
— 2007, Paul Knight, Coding of a Concrete Animal, page 215: