n.
- a tall, slender-leaved plant of the grass family, growing in water or on marshy ground.
[Genera Phragmites and Arundo: several species.]
▸used in names of similar plants growing in wet habitats, e.g. bur-reed.
- a tall, thin, straight stalk of a reed, used especially for thatching.
▸Brit. straw for thatching.
▸literary a rustic musical pipe made from reeds or straw.
- a piece of thin cane or metal which vibrates in a current of air to produce the sound of various musical instruments, as in the mouthpiece of a clarinet or at the base of some organ pipes.
▸a wind instrument played with a reed.
-
(also broken reed)
a weak or impressionable person.
- literary an arrow.
- a weaver's comb-like implement for separating the warp and positioning the weft.
-
(reeds)
a set of semi-cylindrical adjacent mouldings like reeds laid together.
- an electrical contact in a magnetically operated switch or relay.
Derivative
Etymology
OE hrēod, of W. Gmc origin.