What does "quitch" mean?

Elymus repens, couch grass (a species of grass, often considered a weed)

What is a synonym for "quitch"?

Common synonyms include: couch grass, dog grass, quackgrass, quicken, quitch grass.

Quitch

//kwɪt͡ʃ// noun, verb

noun, verb ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1
Elymus repens, couch grass (a species of grass, often considered a weed) uncountable
"we found the bones and ashes half mortered unto the sand and sides of the Urne; and some long roots of Quich, or Dogs-grass wreathed about the bones."

Verb

1
To shake (something); to stir, move. obsolete, transitive
2
To stir; to move. UK, intransitive, regional
"With a strong yron chaine and coller bound, / That once he could not move, nor quich at all […]."
3
To flinch; shrink. intransitive

Synonyms

All synonyms

couch grass dog grass quackgrass quicken quitch grass

Example

More examples

"With a strong yron chaine and coller bound, / That once he could not move, nor quich at all […]."

Etymology

Etymology 1

From Middle English quicchen, quytchen, quecchen, from Old English cweċċan (“to shake, swing, move, vibrate, shake off, give up”). Related to Old English cwacian (“to quake”). More at quake.

Etymology 2

From Middle English quich, a palatalized variant of quike, quyke, from Old English cwice, from Proto-West Germanic *kwikwā, from Proto-Germanic *kwikwǭ. Cognate with Dutch kweek, German Low German Queek, German Quecke.

Related phrases

couch-grass quitch grass couch grass

More for "quitch"

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.