Library / English Dictionary

TURF

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

Irregular inflected form: turves   

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Range of jurisdiction or influence

Example:

a bureaucracy...chiefly concerned with turf...and protecting the retirement system

Classified under:

Nouns denoting spatial position

Hypernyms ("turf" is a kind of...):

jurisdiction (in law; the territory within which power can be exercised)

Domain usage:

colloquialism (a colloquial expression; characteristic of spoken or written communication that seeks to imitate informal speech)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The territory claimed by a juvenile gang as its own

Classified under:

Nouns denoting spatial position

Hypernyms ("turf" is a kind of...):

city district (a district of a town or city)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Surface layer of ground containing a mat of grass and grass roots

Synonyms:

greensward; sod; sward; turf

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural objects (not man-made)

Hypernyms ("turf" is a kind of...):

ground; land; soil (material in the top layer of the surface of the earth in which plants can grow (especially with reference to its quality or use))

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "turf"):

divot (a piece of turf dug out of a lawn or fairway (by an animals hooves or a golf club))

 II. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Cover (the ground) with a surface layer of grass or grass roots

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Hypernyms (to "turf" is one way to...):

cover (provide with a covering or cause to be covered)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Credits

 Context examples: 

Mrs. Rushworth submitted; and the question of surveying the grounds, with the who and the how, was likely to be more fully agitated, and Mrs. Norris was beginning to arrange by what junction of carriages and horses most could be done, when the young people, meeting with an outward door, temptingly open on a flight of steps which led immediately to turf and shrubs, and all the sweets of pleasure-grounds, as by one impulse, one wish for air and liberty, all walked out.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

Right below it there was an exceedingly small hollow of green turf, hidden by banks and a thick underwood about knee-deep, that grew there very plentifully; and in the centre of the dell, sure enough, a little tent of goat-skins, like what the gipsies carry about with them in England.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

"I think you would if you had Laurie for a pupil. I shall be very sorry to lose him next year," said Mr. Brooke, busily punching holes in the turf.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

Mr. Murdstone and I were soon off, and trotting along on the green turf by the side of the road.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

We crossed the marshy bottom and passed over a quarter of a mile of dry, hard turf.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

In silence they wandered together over the velvet turf and on through the broad Minstead woods, where the old lichen-draped beeches threw their circles of black shadow upon the sunlit sward.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Amateur sport is free from betting, but a good deal of outside betting goes on among the public, and it is possible that it might be worth someone’s while to get at a player as the ruffians of the turf get at a race-horse.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

I trode on an edging of turf that the crackle of the pebbly gravel might not betray me: he was standing among the beds at a yard or two distant from where I had to pass; the moth apparently engaged him.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Laurie obediently threw himself down on the turf, and began to amuse himself by sticking daisies into the ribbons of Amy's hat, that lay there.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

“Oh!” said my aunt, “I was not aware at first to whom I had the pleasure of objecting. But I don't allow anybody to ride over that turf. I make no exceptions. I don't allow anybody to do it.”

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)