thresh

American  

[thresh] / θrɛʃ /

verb (used with object)

1. to separate the grain or seeds from (a cereal plant or the like) by some mechanical means, as by beating with a flail or by the action of a threshing machine.

2. to beat as if with a flail.

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verb (used without object)

1. to thresh wheat, grain, etc.

2. to deliver blows as if with a flail.

noun

1. the act of threshing.

verb phrase

1. thresh out / over. thrash.

thresh British  

/ θrɛʃ /

verb

1. to beat or rub stalks of ripe corn or a similar crop either with a hand implement or a machine to separate the grain from the husks and straw

2. (tr) to beat or strike

3. to toss and turn; thrash

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noun

1. the act of threshing

Other Word Forms

• rethresh verb (used with object)
• unthreshed adjective

Etymology

Origin of thresh

before 900; Middle English threschen, thresshen, Old English threscan; cognate with German dreschen, Gothic thriskan; akin to Dutch dorsen, Old Norse thriskja

Explanation

To thresh is to harvest seeds from grain by beating or crushing it. Before the invention of machines to do this task, it took a huge amount of time to thresh grain by hand. To make this tedious task go faster, farmers used to thresh in groups, throwing threshing bees where neighbors worked together. Special sticks called flails were used to beat the seeds out of the grain, and it took about an hour to thresh a bushel of wheat. The threshing machine was invented in the late 1700s, and today most farmers thresh using a combine harvester, which harvests and threshes the grain right in the field.

Example Sentences

I didn’t know that, on a nineteenth-century farm, one might see horses “walking on treadmills that ran machines to compress hay into bundles and to thresh wheat.”

From The New Yorker • Dec. 13, 2016

This Sunday and next also offer the museum’s Matzo Factory, at 1, 1:45 and 2:30 p.m., in which children can thresh and grind wheat and bake their own matzos to take home for Passover.

From New York Times • Apr. 7, 2016

Q: Does he thresh things out with you?

From US News • Jun. 5, 2015

Winter brought the people indoors to weave yarn into fabric, sew clothing, thresh grain, and keep the fires going.

From Textbooks • Dec. 30, 2014

Then, we came and gathered up what remained of the paddy and took it away to thresh and winnow.

From "Nectar in a Sieve" by Kamala Markandaya