strewment

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   archaic and literary: something strewn or intended for strewing, especially flowers scattered over a bier or grave as part of a funeral rite

   The mourners prepared a strewment of rosemary and violets for the maiden's grave.

Formed in English from strew + -ment and first recorded around 1600. Strew descends from Old English streowian ("to scatter"), from a Germanic verb meaning to spread or scatter. The now-archaic noun survives chiefly through Shakespeare's phrase "maiden strewments" in Hamlet, referring to flowers strewn at a maiden's funeral.

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