Definition of CEDE

Do you cede or seed control?

Cede means "to yield or grant typically by treaty." Most of the verb senses of seed are concerned with planting seeds (either literal, as of plants, or figuratively, as of ideas). However, the word may also be used to mean "to schedule (tournament players or teams) so that superior ones will not meet in early rounds." If you relinquish or yield something you are ceding it, and if you are organizing the participants in a tournament you are seeding them.

Did You Know?

Cede is often a formal term used in discussing territory and rights, but is also used less formally. So, for example, Spain ceded Puerto Rico to the U.S. in 1898, following the Spanish-American War, and the U.S. ceded control of the Panama Canal to Panama in 1999. Critics warn that we are ceding leadership in alternative-energy technology to China. Citizens of one European country or another are always worrying that their own country is ceding too much power to the European Union. A tennis player doesn't have any choice when she cedes her no. 1 ranking to a rival.

Examples of cede in a Sentence

Russia ceded Alaska to the U.S. in 1867. she reluctantly ceded her position as leader

Recent Examples on the Web

Instead of our parents or clergy or nobility doing the arranging, agency is ceded to algorithms, offering our online data as dowry. — Richard Morgan, chicagotribune.com, "Facebook doesn't care if you find love — it just wants to be your ‘click-bae’," 3 May 2018 The two cataracts on the footprint of the World Trade Center demand attention by dint of their enormous size alone: Millions of feet of commercial real estate were ceded to the National September 11 Memorial and Museum. — Alexander Nazaryan, Newsweek, "New York City Would Really Rather Not Talk About Its Slavery-Loving Past," 15 Apr. 2015 China probably won’t do that, though, because the US just handed them an even greater win: ceding more leadership and clout to Beijing on the world stage. — Jen Kirby, Vox, "Here’s why Trump threatened to pull out of a 144-year-old postal treaty," 19 Oct. 2018 And carmakers are not enthusiastic about ceding control of their industry to a Silicon Valley upstart. — Timothy B. Lee, Ars Technica, "GM’s self-driving deal with Honda is a wakeup call for Waymo," 4 Oct. 2018 But her brilliant asides, combined with the silken movement of each testament’s ceding to the next, also give us the feeling of watching a deep, cold river. — Joan Frank, SFChronicle.com, "‘Kudos,’ by Rachel Cusk," 6 July 2018 Countries using the common currency have ceded monetary policy to the European Central Bank in Frankfurt, and their fiscal policies are constrained. — Stephen Fidler, WSJ, "Europe’s Political Funk Sets Back Its Economy," 23 Jan. 2019 The city had ceded its bohemianism to its newfound wealth as the toll of the AIDS epidemic climbed higher and higher. — New York Times, "Nan Goldin Survived an Overdose to Fight the Opioid Epidemic," 11 June 2018 The Rockets, to their credit, have ceded nothing in this series. — Ben Golliver, SI.com, "History, Hamstrings and H-Town: Can the Warriors Earn a Fourth Date With LeBron?," 28 May 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'cede.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.