means A small embryonic plant enclosed in a protective coat, capable of growing into a new plant — or, by extension, the starting point of anything (an idea, a fund, a tournament bracket).

from From Old English 'sǣd,' tracing back to a Proto-Germanic root (compare Dutch 'zaad,' German 'Saat') and ultimately to a Proto-Indo-European base meaning 'to sow' — the same ancient root that gives us 'sow' and is a cousin of Latin 'serere,' 'to plant.' So the word and the act have been tangled together for thousands of years: to name the seed was already to imagine the sowing.