Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of mossy
Explanation
Anything covered with or resembling moss is mossy. A mossy rock can be pretty. Mossy teeth are never pretty. Moss tends to grow in a green carpet, especially in wooded or shady areas, so when you're walking through a forest you'll probably come upon mossy areas. Informally, you can also use this adjective to mean "old fashioned" or "dated." Your grandparents' conservative ideas about dating, for example, might be a little mossy. The word stems from an Old English root, meos, that's a close relation to mos, or "bog."
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
These signals get transmitted through the granule cells' axons -- their arm-like extension, known as mossy fibers.
From Science Daily ● Nov. 20, 2024
The exact molecular details of how signal processing in the mossy fiber synapses works are still unknown.
From Science Daily ● Nov. 20, 2024
The massive neck dips, casting a curving shadow on the mossy ground.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 15, 2024
Highly theatrical, it saw the 35-year-old perform inside a mossy grotto, singing on top of a giant mechanical beetle and ascending a tree trunk in fairy wings.
From BBC ● Nov. 15, 2024
Tonight she is wearing green and gold, a mossy dress with an elaborate shining collar that makes the pink of her mouth, her ears, and her eyes stand out.
From "The Cruel Prince" by Holly Black
After that the most Jabez asked of Eddie was to write "Please remit" or "Past due" on the mossier bills.
From In a Little Town by Hughes, Rupert
The new cottages are finely designed, but they are too black-and-white and painty to group easily with the older, mossier buildings and the White Hart Inn, with its nobly ugly sign.
From Highways and Byways in Surrey by Thomson, Hugh
Ah," he said, "I have done fifty, without food, over the roughest and mossiest mountains.
From The Moon Endureth: Tales and Fancies by Buchan, John
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
