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Glite Dictionary
brier patch

brier patch

1 8.1
A thick area of prickly bushes that can scratch you
  • noun
  • /ˈbraɪər pætʃ/
  • US
translation icon : matorral espinoso
  • The children played near the brier patch, careful not to get pricked by the sharp thorns.

Examples

  • I walked for some distance but got off the footpath at some point and was wandering through prickly brier patches and barbed wire fences.

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  • The deer often hide in the brier patch to avoid predators.

  • As I walked through the woods, I stumbled upon a thick brier patch full of tangled shrubs.

Synonyms

brierpatch
vsbrier patch
  • US
9.6

A thick, tangled area of prickly bushes where small animals hide

has identical meaning but is written as one single word

Antonyms

open field
15 1.2

A large area of land without buildings or trees used for play

clearing
2 2.8

An open area in a forest with few trees

How Prickly

thorn bush
2 2.9
brier patch
  • US
1 8.1
to bramble
1 8.8
thicket
22 5.1
brush
  • US
61 2.2
scrub
29 6.2

Surface Forms

brier patch singular
brier patches plural

Morphology

brier + patch

The phrase is compositional: 'brier' denotes a prickly shrub and 'patch' denotes a small area, so the MWE literally means an area covered in briers. Even though 'brier' is low-frequency or dialectal, the noun+noun compounding is transparent and would be understood by a learner who knows the constituents.

Etymology

Brier patch comes from old folk stories about Br'er Rabbit. One popular story says the clever rabbit tricked his hunters into throwing him into a brier patch, because the brier, a thorny bush in the patch, would keep him safe, so today 'brier patch' means 'an area of tangled, prickly bushes' and brings that image to mind.