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swash

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swash

  • /swɒʃ/ UK
  • /swɑʃ/ US

Rhymes with -ɒʃ

Where it comes from

Scandinavian. Compare Swedish dialect svasska, Norwegian svakka, English dialect swack (“a blow”).

noun swashes

  1. countable, uncountable The water that washes up on shore after an incoming wave has broken. It is not the direct battering that breaks the dyke, but overtopping, when the flow of water sweeps away the inland face, so swash length is a vital thing to accommodate, and to do that you must make an estimate of the highest possible tides.
  2. countable, uncountable A narrow sound or channel of water lying within a sand bank, or between a sand bank and the shore, or a bar over which the sea washes. According to what you say about the shells, there ought to be a thousand flamingos feeding in this very swash at this instant.
  3. countable, uncountable A wet splashing sound. As a first warning the boiling liquid lifts the cover and washes over it with a noisy swash and clatter.
  4. countable, uncountable A smooth stroke; a swish. Dip in and out quickly and with a swash three or four times. This serves to wash off the dust that has settled while the fruit is on the trays.
  5. countable, uncountable A swishing noise. The swash of the whirling blades reminds me vaguely of the noise conifers make.
  6. countable, uncountable A long, protruding ornamental line or pen stroke found in some typefaces and styles of calligraphy. Yet Svvaſh-Letters, […] ought to have the Upper Sholder of that Svvaſh Sculped dovvn ſtraight, viz. to a Right Angle, or Square vvith the Face; […]
  7. countable, uncountable A streak or patch. On impulse he took Sunset through Brentwood and saw Cape Jessamines flaring pink above green lawns and here and there a yellow swash of jonquils.
  8. countable, obsolete, uncountable Liquid filth; wash; hog mash. And it setteth the soul at liberty, and maketh her free to follow the will of God and doth to the soul even as health doth unto the body; after that a man is pined and wasted away with a long soaking disease, the legs cannot bear him, he cannot lift up his hands to help himself, his taste is corrupt
  9. countable, obsolete, uncountable A blustering noise.
  10. countable, obsolete, uncountable swaggering behaviour. Some of you are making a great swash in life and after awhile will die, leaving your families beggars, and will expect us ministers of the Gospel to come and lie about your excellencies; but we will not do it.
  11. countable, obsolete, uncountable A swaggering fellow; a swasher.
  12. countable, uncountable An oval figure, whose mouldings are oblique to the axis of the work. The lathe was, in process of time, adapted to the production of oval figures, twisted and swash-work, as it is called, and, lastly, of rose-engine work. The swash, or raking mouldings, were employed in the balusters of staircases and other ornaments at the period of the "Renaissance" in architecture

verb swashes · swashing · swashed

  1. ambitransitive To swagger; to act with boldness or bluster (toward). He swashed out of the room, and presently we heard his angry voice berating his bearer.
  2. ambitransitive To dash or flow noisily; to splash. How the sea rolls swashing ‘gainst the side! Stand by for reefing, hearties!
  3. ambitransitive To swirl through liquid; to swish. The parts are swashed in the solution until they are clean and are then rinsed in cold running water.
  4. intransitive To wade forcefully through liquid. Kala Nag swashed out of the water, blew his trunk clear, and began another climb; but this time he was not alone, and he had not to make his path.
  5. ambitransitive To swipe. '[…] ye ill-farren, useless bowdikite!' said she, as she swashed the dishclout about my lugs,
  6. intransitive To fall violently or noisily. The Archbyshop of Yorke[…]swasht him down, meaning to thrust himselfe in betwixt the Legate, and the Archbyshop of Canterbury.
  7. To streak, to color in a swash. As the valleys darkened, the caps of the hills were swashed in variant hues.

adjective swasher · swashest

  1. bold; dramatic. Very swash in camelly cashmere belted over shirt-tunic and pants in a neat, tiny print of cinnamon–navy–wine–beige crêpe de Chine;
  2. Having pronounced swashes. The French compositor took the greek capitals for latin ones and sought out his swashest type to set the handwritten letters,

Translations

Every language

verb to splash

Русскийплеска́ться pleskátʹsja

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MLA

"swash." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/swash. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026.

APA

swash. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/swash

Chicago

"swash." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/swash.

BibTeX
@misc{swash_2026,
  title = {swash},
  howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://micwyn.com/word/swash},
  urldate = {2026-11-06}
}