Rushiest

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Most thickly overgrown with reeds or rushes, describing the marsh or ground that holds the greatest number of these plants
2. Having the largest amount of tall grass-like wetland plants growing across it, the most reedy of all the places compared
3. Covered in the greatest abundance of rushes, the most densely carpeted with those slender wetland plants of all

Etymology: "Rushiest" is the superlative of "rushy," and the word it ultimately rests on is "rush," the reedy marsh plant. Middle English "russhy" was formed by adding the suffix "-y," meaning "full of" or "having the qualities of," to "rush," so a rushy place was one thick with those plants. The superlative therefore describes whatever is most densely overgrown with rushes, a meaning that has stayed close to its marshy origin. A second, separate source of "rushy" is the verb-like noun "rush" meaning a hurry. Adding "-y" to that sense gives a word for something quick or hasty, and a related form appears in Saterland Frisian, a language spoken in Germany, where "ruusich" means fast or quick. The two origins sit side by side in English, and the superlative can carry either sense depending on which one the context calls for.

Synonyms: reedy, marshy