thicket

American  

[thik-it] / ˈθɪk ɪt /

noun

1. a thick or dense growth of shrubs, bushes, or small trees; a thick coppice.

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thicket British  

/ ˈθɪkɪt /

noun

1. a dense growth of small trees, shrubs, and similar plants

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Other Word Forms

• thicketed adjective
• thickety adjective

Etymology

Origin of thicket

before 1000; Old English thiccet (not recorded in ME), equivalent to thicce thick + -et noun suffix

Example Sentences

Sable quickly got to work but soon ran into a thicket of litigation.

From The Wall Street Journal

Museums trying to upgrade the security of historic buildings have to navigate a thicket of bureaucracy to secure permits.

From The Wall Street Journal

A thicket of partnerships has sprung up in autonomous driving, with Uber also working with Waymo in US cities Austin and Atlanta, and with China's WeRide in Gulf locations such as Abu Dhabi.

From Barron's

Mr. Schaller spent three years studying lions in Africa, once crawling through thorny thickets to count cubs a lioness had hidden there.

From The Wall Street Journal

Below are thickets of green chaparral and densely packed homes.

From Los Angeles Times

Related Words

• clump
• underbrush