Showing results for "parched"

• past participle of parch.
• past tense form of parch.

parched

American  

[pahrcht] / pɑrtʃt /

adjective

1. extremely or completely dried, as by heat, sun, or wind.

   Dry shrubs cover parts of this parched valley in the South Hebron Hills.

2. very thirsty.

   After each shift in the ship’s engine room, I was dead tired and totally parched, needing large amounts of water.

3. (of peas, beans, grains, etc.) slightly toasted or roasted.

   The village folk customarily have one meal a day of parched grains, so there is always a crowd around the old widow’s oven.

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verb

1. the simple past tense and past participle of parch.

Other Word Forms

• parchedness
  noun
• unparched
  adjective
• parchedly
  adverb

Etymology

Origin of parched

parch ( def. ) + -ed ² ( def. )

Explanation

Something parched is excessively dry and hot, in extreme need of water, like a desert, a neglected plant, or your throat after a five-kilometer run. Some foods, like corn, beans, or grains, may be parched, or toasted, to bring out their flavor and help preserve them. American Indians parched corn to make it keep and remain edible over the winter. They taught this to the new colonists, and parched corn later became a staple of explorers like Lewis and Clark, as well as soldiers during the Civil War. Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote of parched corn, "It crackled and crunched, and its taste was sweet and brown."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

parched

El Niño is turning the waterway into another chokepoint in a global economy riddled with them, from the Strait of Hormuz to the parched Rhine.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 29, 2026

The apple harvest in Germany is also expected to take a hit from the parched weather, Germany's Federal Statistical Office said in a report also released Tuesday.

From Barron's ● Aug. 18, 2026

Most of the rain that does eventually fall will be absorbed by the parched ground before it can replenish rivers, exacerbating the problem.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 18, 2026

He arranged the private screening to symbolically request Robert De Niro’s blessing to play the dangerously charismatic Max Cady, an ex-con parched for revenge against those who had a hand in his imprisonment.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 31, 2026

When those packs were set neatly down on the bottom, she told Omakayas to fetch the parched corn, which she had stored in neat skin bags.

From "The Birchbark House" by Louise Erdrich

Related Words

• arid
• scorched
• thirsty
• withered