Word.ws English Dictionary

culm

/ˈkʌlm/

culm noun: waste coal, used as a poor quality fuel.

Noun (1)

culm (countable and uncountable, plural culms)

  1. Waste coal, used as a poor quality fuel.
    • Holonyms: spoils, tailings
    • Here he lay down on a place soft with culm, to take his contemplated rest, and, before he was aware of it, sleep had descended on him, overpowered him, and bound him fast.1887, Homer Greene, chapter XXI, in Burnham Breaker
    Synonyms:
    slack
  2. The spoils from which such low-quality coal can be retrieved.
    • culm dump
    • culm pile
    Synonyms:
    tailings
  3. Anthracite, especially when found in small masses.

Noun (2)

culm (plural culms)

  1. The stem of a plant, especially of grass or sedge.
    • […] because, upon hearing him out, she sank down on the lawn in an impossible posture, examining a grass culm and frowning, he had taken his words back at once; […]1962, Vladimir Nabokov, Pale Fire, page 150

Proper noun (1) capitalized: Culm

Culm

  1. A German bishopric, founded in 1234.

Proper noun (2) capitalized: Culm

Culm

  1. A river in Devon, England, which joins the River Exe near Stoke Canon.

culm meaning in Tamil and Urdu

culm in Tamil

கலம், காரை, புற்றண்டு, கோரைத்தண்டுகள்

culm in Urdu

کوئلے کا چورہ

Synonyms of culm

Forms of culm

pluralculms

Origin of culm

From Middle English culme, colme (“fragments of coal”), of uncertain origin. Probably from Old English *colm, related to Old English col (“coal”). Alternatively, perhaps from Welsh cwlm (“knot or tie”), applied to this species of coal, which is much found in balls or knots in some parts of Wales.

Borrowed from Latin culmus. Doublet of French calame, calamus, and haulm; further related to caramel, chalumeau and shawm.

Words formed from culm

Questions about culm

What does culm mean?
Culm means waste coal, used as a poor quality fuel.
What is culm in Tamil?
Culm in Tamil is கலம், காரை, புற்றண்டு. See Culm meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is culm?
Culm can be a noun or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce culm?
Culm is pronounced /ˈkʌlm/.
What is the plural of culm?
The plural of culm is culms.

Words near culm in the dictionary

  1. cully
  2. Cullybackey
  3. cullying
  4. cullyism
  5. Cullys
  6. culm
  7. Culm Valley
  8. culmacanthid
  9. Culman
  10. Culmann
  11. Culmann's diagram

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: culm (page history and authors); Culm (page history and authors); culm (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); culm (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-culm.wav.

Cite this entry: “culm.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/culm. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.