barley
/ˈbɑːli
/noun [mass noun]
1A hardy cereal with coarse bristles extending from the ears, cultivated especially for use in brewing and stockfeed.
- Genus Hordeum, family Gramineae.
- ‘Winter barleys are in the ground in time to take advantage of moisture from fall rains, winter snowpack, and early spring rainstorms,’ he explains.
- With the first winter barleys cut at the weekend in the Vale of York, harvest has come with a rush and, strangely, this season we are ahead of many of our southern brethren.
1.1The grain of barley.We take our water and mix it with malted barley or grain to make a drink called whisky....
- In Korea, while rice is the staple grain, barley is consumed in between the rice production seasons.
- The staple food of Tibet, tsampa, is toasted barley ground to a flour.
Origin
Old English bærlic (adjective), from bære, bere 'barley' + -lic (see -ly1).
barn from Old English:
A barn was originally a place for storing barley (Old English), the word coming from Old English from bere ‘barley’ and ern ‘house’. In the 1940s barn started to be used in particle physics as a unit of areas. It is apparently from the phrase as big as a barn door, a long established measure of size.
Rhymes
- lower plants
- lower-ranking
- lower regions
- Lower Saxony
- lower school
- lower second
- lower sixth
- lower the boom on
- lower the tone
- lower working class
- lower world
- lowest common denominator
- lowest common multiple
- Lowestoft
- low-fat
- low feeding
- low fermentation
- low fever
- low-fi
- low fidelity
- low-field
- low-five
- low-flash
- low-floor
- low-flung