Rushy

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Covered with rushes or overgrown with the reedy plants ; made of or resembling the stiff, pliant stems of rushes
2. Thick with growing reeds or marsh grasses ; having the look or feel of rush stems
3. Overgrown with a profusion of rushes ; consisting of or appearing like the slender reedy stalks of rushes

Etymology: Rushy is a plain formation: English took the noun "rush", the name of a grassy marsh plant, and added the suffix "-y", meaning "full of" or "abounding in". A rushy meadow or rushy bank is one thick with those reedy plants. The adjective is recorded in Middle English in forms such as "russhy" and "resshi", so it was already in use in the medieval period. The same spelling hides a second word. "Rush" can also mean "a hurry", and a rushy sense, meaning quick or hasty, comes from that verb-noun rather than the plant. Related forms in other languages show the link, such as the Saterland Frisian "ruusich", which means "fast" or "quick" and also "rushy". English speakers today rarely use the adjective in either sense, so the two origins mostly survive as a pair of homographs.

Synonyms: reedy, grassy