sargasso

American  

[sahr-gas-oh] / sɑrˈgæs oʊ /

noun

plural

sargassos

1. a gulfweed.

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sargasso British  

/ sɑːˈɡæsəʊ /

noun

1. another name for gulfweed sargassum

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Etymology

Origin of sargasso

1590–1600; < Portuguese, perhaps special use of sargaço rockrose < Latin salicastrum, equivalent to salic- (stem of salix ) willow + -astrum, neuter of -aster -aster ¹

Explanation

Use the noun sargasso when you're talking about a particular kind of seaweed that's mostly found in the Atlantic Ocean, including the region known as the Sargasso Sea. Most folks are more familiar with the place than the name for it; sargasso is a kind of brown seaweed that floats in huge masses, sometimes so dense that you'd think you could walk on it (though this is not recommended). The alternative name, gulfweed, is a nod towards the Gulf of Mexico, home to quite a lot of sargasso.

Example Sentences

He looks ahead at some floating sargasso weed, where some flying fishes are skittering through the air.

From Time Magazine Archive

Space yawned at them, black enormous, the silent ships, the dead sargasso ships, floating slowly by, eternally, unhurried....

From The Graveyard of Space by Marlowe, Stephen

No, the sargasso weed floats and lives on the surface.

From The White Squall A Story of the Sargasso Sea by Schonberg, J.

It was a sargasso like the legendary Sargasso Seas of Earth's early sailing days, becalmed seas, seas without wind, with choking Sargasso weed, seas that snared and entrapped....

From The Graveyard of Space by Marlowe, Stephen

Out of it flying-fish leaped, and through it dolphins swam in pairs, and over it sargasso drifted like cloud shadows.

From True to His Home A Tale of the Boyhood of Franklin by Pierce, H. Winthrop