herse

herse

See also: Herse and hèrse

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /hɜː(ɹ)s/

• Audio (UK)

  (file)

• Homophone: hearse
• Rhymes: -ɜː(ɹ)s

Noun

herse (plural herses)

1. A kind of gate or portcullis, having iron bars, like a harrow, studded with iron spikes, hung above gateways so that it may be quickly lowered to impede the advance of an enemy.
   • 1848, Benjamin Webb, Sketches of Continental Ecclesiolgy:

     In the south aisle, on a slab raised on four low shafts and covered by an iron herse, is a fine coloured recumbent effigy of a bishop

2. Obsolete form of hearse (a carriage for the dead)
3. (obsolete) A funeral ceremony.
   • 1579, Immeritô [pseudonym; Edmund Spenser], “Nouember. Aegloga Vndecima.”, in The Shepheardes Calender: […], London: […] Hugh Singleton, […], OCLC 606515406; reprinted as H[einrich] Oskar Sommer, editor, The Shepheardes Calender […], London: John C. Nimmo, […], 1890, OCLC 890162479:

     Dido, my deare, alas!
     Dead, and lyeth wrapt in lead. O heavie herse!

Verb

herse (third-person singular simple present herses, present participle hersing, simple past and past participle hersed)

1. Alternative form of hearse
   • 1646, Richard Crashaw, Sospetto d'Herode

     The house is hers'd about with a black wood, Which nods with many a heavy-headed tree: Each flower's a pregnant poison, try'd and good; Each herb a plague.

   • [1611?], Homer, “(please specify |book=I to XXIV)”, in Geo[rge] Chapman, transl., The Iliads of Homer Prince of Poets. […], London: […] Nathaniell Butter, OCLC 614803194; The Iliads of Homer, Prince of Poets, […], volume (please specify the book number), new edition, London: Charles Knight and Co., […], 1843, OCLC 987451361:

   • c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act III, scene i]:

     I would my daughter were dead at my foot, and the jewels in her ear. O, would she were hers'd at my foot, and the ducats in her coffin.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for herse in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913)

Anagrams

• Esher, Rhees, Sheer, Shere, heers, here's, heres, sheer

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French

Etymology

From Old French herce, from Latin hirpex, hirpicis. The initial aspiration is said to be onomatopoetic, but may also be due to influence by the unrelated Germanic words at hand in Old Norse herfi, English harrow.

Pronunciation

• ^{(aspirated h)} IPA^(key): /ɛʁs/

Noun

herse f (plural herses)

1. harrow (device for breaking up soil)
2. portcullis (gate in the form of a grating)
3. spike strip, road spikes, traffic spikes
4. grate, grill (especially to block large objects floating down a river)
5. candlestick, candelabrum (with a triangular base and spikes to hold large candles)
6. stage lighting instrument, luminaire that disperses light over a stage
7. (heraldry) portcullis

Verb

herse

1. inflection of herser:
   1. first/third-person singular present indicative/subjunctive
   2. second-person singular present imperative

Further reading

• “herse”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.