parched
adj 1: dried out by heat or excessive exposure to sunlight; "a
vast desert all adust"; "land lying baked in the heat";
"parched soil"; "the earth was scorched and bare";
"sunbaked salt flats" [syn: adust, baked, parched,
scorched, sunbaked]
2: toasted or roasted slightly; "parched corn was a staple of
the Indian diet"
parched
1. If something, especially the ground or a plant, is parched, it is very dry, because
there has been no rain.
...a hill of parched brown grass.ADJ
2. If your mouth, throat, or lips are parched, they are unpleasantly dry.
ADJ
3. If you say that you are parched, you mean that you are very thirsty. (INFORMAL)
ADJ: v-link ADJ
Parch \Parch\ (p[aum]rch), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Parched; p. pr.
& vb. n. Parching.] [OE. perchen to pierce, hence used of a
piercing heat or cold, OF. perchier, another form of percier,
F. percer. See Pierce.]
1. To burn the surface of; to scorch; to roast over the fire,
as dry grain; as, to parch the skin; to parch corn.
Ye shall eat neither bread, nor parched corn. --Lev.
xxiii. 14.
2. To dry to extremity; to shrivel with heat; as, the mouth
is parched from fever.
The ground below is parched. --Dryden.
PARCHED
parcht: Four different root words have been translated "parched" in English
Versions of the Bible:
(1) qalah, "roasted." This word is applied to corn or pulse. It is a common
practice in Palestine and Syria to roast the nearly ripe wheat for eating
as a delicacy. A handful of heads of fully developed grain, with the stalks
still attached, are gathered and bound together and then, holding the bunch
by the lower ends of the stalks, the heads are toasted over a fire of straw
or thorn bush. By the time most of the sheaths are blackened the grain is
toasted, and, after rubbing off the husks between the hands, is ready to eat
(Le 2:14). A form of pulse is toasted in the same way and is more
sought after than the grain. In the larger towns and cities, venders go about
the streets selling bunches of toasted chick-peas. The Bible references,
however, are probably to another form of roasted grain. The threshed wheat
or pulse is roasted over a fire on an iron pan or on a fiat stone, being kept
in constant motion with a stirrer until the operation is finished. The grain
thus prepared is a marketable article. Parched grain is not now so commonly
met with as the pulse, which either roasted or unroasted is called chommoc
(from Arabic "to roast" or "parch"). Parched pulse is eaten not only plain,
but is often made into confection by coating the seeds with sugar. In Bible
times parched wheat or pulse was a common food, even taking the place of
bread (Le 23:14; Jos 5:11; Ru 2:14). It was a useful food supply
for armies, as it required no further cooking (1Sa 17:17). It was
frequently included in gifts or hostages (1Sa 25:18; 2Sa 17:28).
(2) charer, "burned" or "parched" (compare Arabic chariq, "burned"), is used
in the sense of dried up or arid in Jer 17:6.
(3) tsicheh, is used in Isa 5:13, the King James Version "dried up"
the Revised Version (British and American) "parched" tsechichah in Ps
68:6, the King James Version "dry," the Revised Version (British and
American) "parched."
(4) sharabh, rendered "parched" in the King James Version, is "glowing" in
the Revised Version (British and American). The word implies the peculiar
wavy effect of the air above parched ground, usually accompanied by mirages
(compare Arabic serdb, "mirage") (Isa 35:7; 49:10). In predicting
a happy future for Zion the prophet could have chosen no greater contrast
than that the hot glowing sands which produce illusive water effects should
be changed into real pools.
See MIRAGE.
James A. Patch
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