Adjacent Words

Swamp definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

SWAMP, n. Spungy land; low ground filled with water; soft wet ground. In New England, I believe this word is never applied to marsh, or the boggy land made by the overflowing of salt water, but always to low soft ground in the interior country; wet and spungy land, but not usually covered with water. This is the true meaning of the word. Swamps are often mowed. In England, the word is explained in books by boggy land, morassy or marshy ground.
SWAMP, v.t. To plunge, whelm or sink in a swamp; to plunge into difficulties inextricable.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

n
1: low land that is seasonally flooded; has more woody plants than a marsh and better drainage than a bog [syn: swamp, swampland]
2: a situation fraught with difficulties and imponderables; "he was trapped in a medical swamp" v
1: drench or submerge or be drenched or submerged; "The tsunami swamped every boat in the harbor" [syn: swamp, drench]
2: fill quickly beyond capacity; as with a liquid; "the basement was inundated after the storm"; "The images flooded his mind" [syn: deluge, flood, inundate, swamp]

Merriam Webster's

I. noun Etymology: perhaps alteration of Middle English sompe, from Middle Dutch somp morass; akin to Middle High German sumpf marsh, Greek somphos spongy Date: 1624 1. a wetland often partially or intermittently covered with water; especially one dominated by woody vegetation 2. a tract of swamp 3. a difficult or troublesome situation or subject • swamp adjective II. verb Date: 1784 transitive verb 1. a. to fill with or as if with water ; inundate, submerge b. to overwhelm numerically or by an excess of something ; flood <swamped with work> 2. to open by removing underbrush and debris intransitive verb to become submerged

Oxford Reference Dictionary

n. & v. --n. a piece of waterlogged ground; a bog or marsh. --v. 1 a tr. overwhelm, flood, or soak with water. b intr. become swamped. 2 tr. overwhelm or make invisible etc. with an excess or large amount of something. Derivatives: swampy adj. (swampier, swampiest). Etymology: 17th c., = dial. swamp sunk (14th c.), prob. of Gmc orig.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Swamp Swamp, v. i. 1. To sink or stick in a swamp; figuratively, to become involved in insuperable difficulties. 2. To become filled with water, as a boat; to founder; to capsize or sink; figuratively, to be ruined; to be wrecked.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Swamp Swamp, n. [Cf. AS. swam a fungus, OD. swam a sponge, D. zwam a fungus, G. schwamm a sponge, Icel. sv["o]ppr, Dan. & Sw. swamp, Goth. swamms, Gr. somfo`s porous, spongy.] Wet, spongy land; soft, low ground saturated with water, but not usually covered with it; marshy ground away from the seashore. Gray swamps and pools, waste places of the hern. --Tennyson. A swamp differs from a bog and a marsh in producing trees and shrubs, while the latter produce only herbage, plants, and mosses. --Farming Encyc. (E. Edwards, Words). Swamp blackbird. (Zo["o]l.) See Redwing (b) . Swamp cabbage (Bot.), skunk cabbage. Swamp deer (Zo["o]l.), an Asiatic deer (Rucervus Duvaucelli) of India. Swamp hen. (Zo["o]l.) (a) An Australian azure-breasted bird (Porphyrio bellus); -- called also goollema. (b) An Australian water crake, or rail (Porzana Tabuensis); -- called also little swamp hen. (c) The European purple gallinule. Swamp honeysuckle (Bot.), an American shrub (Azalea, or Rhododendron, viscosa) growing in swampy places, with fragrant flowers of a white color, or white tinged with rose; -- called also swamp pink. Swamp hook, a hook and chain used by lumbermen in handling logs. Cf. Cant hook. Swamp itch. (Med.) See Prairie itch, under Prairie. Swamp laurel (Bot.), a shrub (Kalmia glauca) having small leaves with the lower surface glaucous. Swamp maple (Bot.), red maple. See Maple. Swamp oak (Bot.), a name given to several kinds of oak which grow in swampy places, as swamp Spanish oak (Quercus palustris), swamp white oak (Q. bicolor), swamp post oak (Q. lyrata). Swamp ore (Min.), bog ore; limonite. Swamp partridge (Zo["o]l.), any one of several Australian game birds of the genera Synoicus and Excalfatoria, allied to the European partridges. Swamp robin (Zo["o]l.), the chewink. Swamp sassafras (Bot.), a small North American tree of the genus Magnolia (M. glauca) with aromatic leaves and fragrant creamy-white blossoms; -- called also sweet bay. Swamp sparrow (Zo["o]l.), a common North American sparrow (Melospiza Georgiana, or M. palustris), closely resembling the song sparrow. It lives in low, swampy places. Swamp willow. (Bot.) See Pussy willow, under Pussy.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Swamp Swamp, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Swamped; p. pr. & vb. n. Swamping.] 1. To plunge or sink into a swamp. 2. (Naut.) To cause (a boat) to become filled with water; to capsize or sink by whelming with water. 3. Fig.: To plunge into difficulties and perils; to overwhelm; to ruin; to wreck. The Whig majority of the house of Lords was swamped by the creation of twelve Tory peers. --J. R. Green. Having swamped himself in following the ignis fatuus of a theory. --Sir W. Hamilton.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(swamps, swamping, swamped) 1. A swamp is an area of very wet land with wild plants growing in it. N-VAR 2. If something swamps a place or object, it fills it with water. A rogue wave swamped the boat... VERB: V n 3. If you are swamped by things or people, you have more of them than you can deal with. He is swamped with work... VERB: usu passive, be V-ed

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

I. n. Bog, fen, quagmire, morass, marsh, slough, marish, spongy land, soft and wet ground. II. v. a. 1. Engulf, sink, whelm, swallow up. 2. (Naut.) Upset, overset, sink, whelm, capsize. 3. Plunge into difficulties, sink, wreck, ruin, run aground, embarrass.

Moby Thesaurus

baygall, be prodigal with, bind, bog, bottom, bottomland, bottoms, buffalo wallow, cascade, cataract, cesspool, cloaca, cloaca maxima, clutch, complication, crunch, deluge, dip, drain, drown, duck, dump, dunk, embarrassing position, embarrassment, engulf, everglade, fen, fenland, fine how-do-you-do, float, flood, flood the market, flow on, founder, garbage dump, glade, hell to pay, hobble, hog wallow, holm, hot water, how-do-you-do, imbroglio, immerse, inundate, jam, marais, marish, marsh, marshland, meadow, mere, mess, mire, mix, moor, moorland, morass, moss, mud, mud flat, overbrim, overburden, overcome, overdose, overequip, overflow, overfurnish, overlavish, overload, overprovender, overprovide, overprovision, overrun, oversell, overstock, oversupply, overtax, overwhelm, parlous straits, pass, peat bog, pickle, pinch, plight, pour on, pour out, pour over, predicament, pretty pass, pretty pickle, pretty predicament, purgatory, quag, quagmire, quicksand, rain, run over, salt marsh, scrape, scuttle, septic tank, sewer, shaking, sink, slob land, slop, slosh, slough, sluice, snow under, sough, spill, spill out, spill over, spot, squeeze, stew, sticky wicket, strait, straits, submerge, sump, swale, swampland, sweep, taiga, tight spot, tight squeeze, tightrope, tricky spot, unholy mess, view, wallow, wash, whelm