Meaning: seed

Illustrative Context

I only had ten seeds to plant and the birds ate them all.

Target Sense

• The most basic, generic term for a seed in the prototypical sense defined as follows: hard and dry, typically roundish, as would be pecked at by birds, and in size typically between that of a mustard seed to a sunflower seed.
• Languages typically distinguish a range of different terms, varying by type of seed and plant. For IE-CoR, however, enter the most generic term in the basic vocabulary that covers the prototypical sense and would be most natural in the illustrative context above.
• As a generic term, the lexeme entered should ideally be applicable to more than just cereals, i.e. also to many flowers and relatively small plants, irrespective of whether they are a food source for humans.
• Follow common usage and basic vocabulary. Strict technical and biological classification criteria are not necessarily relevant — on this, see also the definitions for the separate IE-CoR meanings tree, snake, wing and ant.
• Avoid terms that focus on seeds viewed specifically as a food source, to be ground into flour or otherwise eaten.
• Avoid terms closer to English nut, relatively larger and viewed as a food source.
• Avoid terms specific to the stony cores of fruit such as a peach or avocado.
• The lexeme entered should be applicable to an individual seed, and thus will normally be a count noun in the singular form, e.g. French graine, not semence. Only if the default noun in basic vocabulary is a non-count or collective noun, and specifying a single seed would require additional singulative morphology, should this non-count form be entered.
• The target register is a neutral, default one: avoid technical botanical or agricultural terms.