hedge

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   minimize loss or risk

   diversify your financial portfolio to hedge price risks

2. 2
   verb

   enclose or bound in with or as it with a hedge or hedges

   hedge the property

3. 3
   verb

   hinder or restrict with or as if with a hedge

   The animals were hedged in

4. 4
   noun

   A thicket of bushes or other shrubbery, especially one planted as a fence between two portions of land, or to separate the parts of a garden.

   He trims the hedge once a week.

5. 5
   noun

   A barrier (often consisting of a line of persons or objects) to protect someone or something from harm.

   Then Satan answered the Lord, and said, Doth Job fear God for nought? Hast not thou made an hedge about him, and about his house, and about all that he hath on every side? thou hast blessed the work of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land.

6. 6
   noun

   A noncommittal or intentionally ambiguous statement.

   When not inaccurate, much commentary on the contents of Hobson-Jobson is couched in hedges or relies on speculative estimates in the absence of exact information.

7. 7
   noun

   Contract or arrangement reducing one's exposure to risk (for example the risk of price movements or interest rate movements).

   The asset class acts as a hedge.

8. 8
   noun

   With indication of a person's upbringing, or professional activities, taking place by the side of the road; being third-rate, poor, shoddy.

   Attalus[…]made him so dead-drunke that insensibly and without feeling he might prostitute his beauty as the body of a common hedge-harlot, to Mulettiers, Groomes and many of the abject servants of his house.

Etymology

From Middle English hegge, from Old English heċġ, from Proto-West Germanic *haggju, from Proto-Germanic *hagjō, from Proto-Indo-European *kagʰyóm (“enclosure”). Cognate with Dutch heg, German Hecke. Doublet of hey (a choreographic figure) and quay. More at haw.