Learn English – What does “produce” mean here

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The jetties coming out into the river, and a host of ships in the Middle Ages, little wooden ships ferrying produce across from the Continent and back. (Source)

The structure of the whole sentence is quite confusing to me: how can I understand it?

I looked it up here. I would have picked the fourth meaning,

if you produce an object, you bring it out or present it, so that people can see or consider it

When challenged, he produced a gun.

But produce is not transitive in my example.

Best Answer

You've got to scroll down further on your definition page to:

Definition of produce

prod-uce: noun [uncountable]
food or other things that have been grown or produced on a farm to be sold

You see that produce can also be a noun, so it means crops, food, or other things produced on a farm (and, might I add, elsewhere as well.)

Therefore, the sentence means:

The jetties coming out into the river, and a host of ships in the Middle Ages, little wooden ships ferrying things produced on farms across from the Continent and back.

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