SQUASH • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Squash

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/skwɑʃ/ Listen

noun

Squash n. (Zool.) An American animal allied to the weasel. (Obs.)

Squash n. (Bot.) A plant and its fruit of the genus Cucurbita, or gourd kind. Note: The species are much confused. The long-neck squash is called Cucurbita verrucosa, the Barbary or China squash, Cucurbita moschata, and the great winter squash, Cucurbita maxima, but the distinctions are not clear.

Squash beetle (Zool.), a small American beetle (Diabrotica vittata, syn. Galeruca vittata) which is often abundant and very injurious to the leaves of squash, cucumber, etc. It is striped with yellow and black. The name is applied also to other allied species.

Squash bug (Zool.), a large black American hemipterous insect (Coreus tristis syn. Anasa tristis) injurious to squash vines.

Squash n.

Something soft and easily crushed; especially, an unripe pod of pease. "Not yet old enough for a man, nor young enough for a boy; as a squash is before 't is a peascod."

Hence, something unripe or soft; used in contempt. "This squash, this gentleman."

A sudden fall of a heavy, soft body; also, a shock of soft bodies. "My fall was stopped by a terrible squash."

A game much like rackets, played in a walled court with soft rubber balls and bats like tennis rackets; called also squash rackets.

verb

Squash v. t. (past & past part. squashed; pres. part. squashing) To beat or press into pulp or a flat mass; to crush.

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Etymology of 'Squash'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Squash" Quotes from Famous Books

... earthly countenance. His hands were small and prehensile, with fingers knotted like a cord; and they were continually flickering in front of him in violent and expressive pantomime. As for Tabary, a broad, complacent, admiring imbecility breathed from his squash nose and slobbering lips; he had become a thief, just as he might have become the most decent of burgesses, by the imperious chance that rules the lives of ...

— Stories By English Authors: France • Various

... Cucumber.—These exotic fruits are extensively cultivated; the latter takes various shapes in our bills of fare; the former is more a luxury than a fruit for general use; their culture on hot-beds forms a material branch of modern gardening, and with that of the gourd, pumpkin, squash, vegetable marrow, ...

— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 281, November 3, 1827 • Various

... squashes. We carry ten or a dozen of these on board our boats, and hurriedly leave, not willing to be caught in the robbery, yet excusing ourselves by pleading our great want. We run down a short distance to where we feel certain no Indians can follow; and what a kettle of squash sauce we make! True, we have no salt with which to season it, but it makes a fine addition to our unleavened bread and coffee. Never was fruit so sweet as those stolen squashes. After dinner we push ...

— Little Masterpieces of Science: Explorers • Various

... Champlain received visits from many Indians, differing entirely from either the Etchemins or the Armouchiquois. They found the soil tilled and cultivated, and the corn in the gardens was about two feet in height. Beans, pumpkins and squash were also in flower. The place was very pleasant and agreeable at the time, but Champlain believed the weather was very severe ...

— The Makers of Canada: Champlain • N. E. Dionne

... the name two or three times gently, while Lila smiled in shy appreciation of Mr. Brotherton's ambushed joke. Her father, standing by a squash-necked lavender jug in the "serenity," did not entirely grasp Mr. Brotherton's point. But while the father was groping for ...

— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White

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