garnish
Part of speech: verb
noun
Morphological type: simple
Topics: cooking
food
law
lifestyle
Etymology: From Middle English garnysshen, from Old French garniss-, stem of certain forms of the verb garnir, guarnir, warnir (“to provide, furnish, avert, defend, warn, fortify, garnish”), from a conflation of Old Frankish *warnijan (“to refuse, deny”) and *warnōn (“warn, protect, prepare, beware, guard oneself”), from Proto-Germanic *warnijaną (“to worry, care, heed”) and Proto-Germanic *warnōną (“to warn”); both from Proto-Indo-European *wer- (“to defend, protect, cover”). Cognate with Old English wiernan (“to withhold, be sparing of, deny, refuse, reject, decline, forbid, prevent from, avert”) and warnian (“to warn, caution, take warning, take heed, guard oneself against, deny”). More at warn.
Inflected forms:
form: garnishes
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: garnishing
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: garnished
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: garnished
pos: verb
tags: past
form: garnishes
pos: noun
tags: plural
Senses:
gloss: To decorate with ornaments; to adorn; to embellish.
pos: verb
examples: And all within with flowres was garnished,
1710, Joseph Addison, The Tatler, No. 163, 25 April, 1710, Glasgow: Robert Urie, 1754, p. 165,
[…] as that admirable writer has the best and worst verses of any among our English poets, Ned Softly has got all the bad ones without book, which he repeats upon occasion, to shew his reading, and garnish his conversation.
[…] the whip […] was garnished with a massive horse’s head of plated metal.
gloss: To ornament with something placed around it.
pos: verb
examples: a dish garnished with a sprig/spray of parsley
gloss: To furnish; to supply.
pos: verb
tags: archaic
examples: By his spirit he hath garnished the heavens; his hand hath formed the crooked serpent.
[…] the good-humoured, affectionate-hearted Godfrey Cass was fast becoming a bitter man, visited by cruel wishes, that seemed to enter, and depart, and enter again, like demons who had found in him a ready-garnished home.
gloss: To fit with fetters; to fetter.
pos: verb
tags: archaic
slang
gloss: To warn by garnishment; to give notice to.
pos: verb
gloss: To have (money) set aside by court order (particularly for the payment of alleged debts); to garnishee.
pos: verb
examples: When the editorial board of Fire met again, we did not plan a new issue, but emptied our pockets to help poor Thurman whose wages were being garnished weekly because he had signed for the printer’s bills.
gloss: A set of dishes, often pewter, containing a dozen pieces of several types.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
gloss: Pewter vessels in general.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: The accounts of collegiate and monastic institutions give abundant entries of the price of pewter vessels, called also garnish.
gloss: Something added for embellishment.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: 1718, Matthew Prior, Alma: or, The Progress of the Mind, Canto 1, in Poems on Several Occasions, London: Jacob Tonson, p. 333,
First Poets, all the World agrees,
Write half to profit, half to please
Matter and figure They produce;
For Garnish This, and That for Use;
This hard-headed old Overreach approved of the sentimental song, as the suitable garnish for girls, and also as fundamentally fine, sentiment being the right thing for a song.
There had been a semblance of chivalry in the attitude from which, at the beginning of their marriage, he had briefly regarded her; but forty-seven years had efficiently disposed of that garnish of politeness.
gloss: Clothes; garments, especially when showy or decorative.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: So are you, sweet,
Even in the lovely garnish of a boy.
gloss: Something set round or upon a dish as an embellishment.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
gloss: Fetters.
pos: noun
tags: countable
obsolete
slang
uncountable
gloss: A fee; specifically, in English jails, formerly an unauthorized fee demanded from a newcomer by the older prisoners.
pos: noun
tags: historical
slang
uncountable
examples: 1699, B. E., A New Dictionary of the Canting Crew, London: W. Hawes et al.,
Garnish money, what is customarily spent among the Prisoners at first coming in.
This person then […] acquainted him that it was the custom of the place for every prisoner, upon his first arrival there, to give something to the former prisoners to make them drink. This, he said, was what they called garnish; and concluded with advising his new customer to draw his purse upon the present occasion.
gloss: Cash.
pos: noun
tags: US
countable
slang
uncountable
Related words: garment
garnison
garniture
Derived words: disgarnish
garnishable
garnishee
garnisher
garnishment
garnishor
garnishry
regarnish
ungarnish
all garnish and no meat
garnish bolt
Translations: