sedgy, a.
(ˈsɛdʒɪ)
Also α. 4, 6 seggy, 6 siedgie; β. 9 (dial.) seggy.
[f. sedge n.1 + -y.]
1. Covered or bordered with sedge or sedges.
| [c 1318 in Wallace James Deeds East Lothian (1899) 10 Duas acras ad Seggy-wellis heved.] 1566 Act 8 Eliz. c. 8 §1 The Maryshes and Seggie Fenne Groundes w{supt}{suph}in the sayd Isle [of Ely]. 1596 Shakes. 1 Hen. IV, i. iii. 98 On the gentle Seuernes siedgie banke. 1666 Dryden Ann. Mirab. ccxxxii, Deep in his Ooze he sought his sedgy Bed. 1764 Oxf. Sausage 100 Charwell, thy sedgy Banks, and glist'ring Streams All laugh and sing at mild Approach of Morn. 1810 Scott Lady of L. i. xxxi, The bittern..Booming from the sedgy shallow. 1881 Harper's Mag. Sept. 521 The sedgy end Of yonder well-known bight. |
b. transf. and fig.
| 1659 C. Noble Moderate Answ. to Immod. Queries To Rdr. 1 Can these rushy and sedgy expressions that are set down in this Paper grow any where, but from marish, myrie grounds and principles? 1862 Burton Bk. Hunter 103 Those terrible folios of the scholastic divines,..their majestic stream of central print overflowing into rivulets of marginal notes sedgy with citations. |
2. Having the nature or properties of sedge.
| 1625 Heylin Cosmogr. (ed. 2) 747 On the bankes of this riuer [Nilus] also grew those sedgie weedes called Papyri. 1662 Bargrave Alex. VII (1867) 124 It was covered, he said, with long sedgy grass growing about it, under the dripp of an higher rock. 1808–13 A. Wilson Amer. Ornith. (1831) III. 185 Its flesh, though esteemed by many, tastes some⁓what sedgy, or fishy. 1830 Lindley Nat. Syst. Bot. 284 The herbaceous sedgy habit of the latter [the Bulrush tribe]. 1878 Buller New Zealand i. Introd. 17 A small spider, which is confined to a sedgy grass on the sea-coast. |
† 3. Made of or thatched with sedge. Obs.
| 1624 Tragedy of Nero iv. i. (1633) F 3, [Thou] dost rather choose, The smoaky reedes and sedgy cottages, Then the proud roofes..of Kings. a 1835 Mrs. Hemans Angler 22 'Tis not the bittern, by the wave Seeking her sedgy nest. |