Weeded

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. Took out unwanted plants from soil or garden areas ; removed items or elements considered unnecessary or undesirable from a collection or group
2. Cleared a place by pulling out undesirable vegetation ; got rid of things deemed unwanted or superfluous from a set or arrangement
3. Extracted weeds from growing spots to improve growth conditions ; selected and eliminated items that were seen as unnecessary or irrelevant from an assortment

Etymology: The verb "weeded" is simply the past tense and past participle of "weed," so its story is really the story of the noun and verb it comes from. The verb descends from Old English "wēodian," meaning to weed, which traces back to a Proto-Germanic root "*weudōną," meaning to uproot. The noun "weed," meaning an unwanted plant, comes from the Old English "wēod," and the two forms share a root with words across the Germanic languages, including Dutch "wied" and German Low German "Weed," which still carry the sense of an unwanted plant. Those older meanings are mostly concrete: pulling up plants from a garden or field. The figurative sense, getting rid of things that are unwanted or superfluous from a set or arrangement, is a later extension of the same idea. Clearing a plot of ground became a model for clearing out anything that crowds out what is valued, so a list, a collection or a team can be weeded in the same way a garden bed can.

Synonyms: cleared, removed

Antonyms: added, included