scythe

English

Alternative forms

• (archaic): sithe, sythe
• (Exmoor dialect): zive

Etymology

From Middle English sythe, sithe, from Old English sīþe, sīgþe, sigdi (“sickle”), from Proto-West Germanic *sigiþi, from Proto-Germanic *sigiþiz, *sigiþō, derived from *seg- (“saw”), from Proto-Indo-European *sek- (“to cut”).

Immediate Germanic cognates include Middle Low German sēgede, Dutch zicht, Icelandic sigð (all “sickle”). More distantly related with Dutch zeis, German Sense (both “scythe”). Also akin to English saw, which see.

The silent c crept in during the early 15th century owing to pseudoetymological association with Medieval Latin scissor (“tailor, carver”), from Latin scindere (“to cut, rend, split”).

The verb, which was first used in the intransitive sense, is from the noun.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈsaɪð/, (some accents) IPA^(key): /ˈsaɪθ/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -aɪð, -aɪθ

Noun

scythe (plural scythes)

1. An instrument for mowing grass, grain, etc. by hand, composed of a long, curving blade with a sharp concave edge, fastened to a long handle called a snath.
   • 1609, William Shakespeare, “Sonnet 12”, in Shake-speares Sonnets. , London: By G[eorge] Eld for T[homas] T[horpe] and are to be sold by William Aspley, →OCLC:

     And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence
     Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.

   • 1886, Peter Christen Asbjørnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 41:

     Early next morning the gudewife took a scythe on her shoulder, and went out in the fields with the hay-mowers to mow.

2. (historical) A scythe-shaped blade attached to ancient war chariots.
3. (cartomancy) The tenth Lenormand card.

Derived terms

• nature's scythe

Translations

Further reading

• Scythe on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Scythe in the Encyclopædia Britannica (11th edition, 1911)

Verb

scythe (third-person singular simple present scythes, present participle scything, simple past and past participle scythed)

1. (intransitive) To use a scythe.
2. (transitive) To cut with a scythe.
3. (transitive) To cut off as with a scythe; to mow.
4. (intransitive, figurative, often with through) To attack or injure as if cutting.
   • 2011, Catherine Sampson, The Pool of Unease:

     The boy began to keen, and the high-pitched noise scythed through Song's head.

   • 2019 February 27, Drachinifel, 20:09 from the start, in The Battle of Samar - Odds? What are those?‎, archived from the original on 3 November 2022:

     The smaller shells make a complete slaughterhouse of the bridge, and the splinters scythe through anyone out on deck.

Derived terms

• scythe down
• scytheman
• scyther

Translations

References

Anagrams

• Tyches, chesty

French

Etymology

See Scythe (“Scythian”)

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /sit/
• Homophones: cite, citent, cites, scythes, Scythe, Scythes, site, sites

Adjective

scythe (plural scythes)

1. Scythian

Further reading

• “scythe”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé , 2012.