Mere (lake)

Lake, pond, or wetland In Great Britain, a mere is a lake, pond, or wetland, often shallow. Derivation of the word Etymology The word mere is recorded in Old English as mere ″sea, lake″, corresponding to Old Saxon meri, Old Low Franconian *meri (Dutch meer ″lake, pool″, Picard mer ″pool, lake″, Northern French toponymic element -mer), Old High German mari / meri (German Meer ″sea″, but also Maar ″circular lake″), Goth. mari-, marei, Old Norse marr ″sea″ (Norwegian mar ″sea″, Shetland Norn mar ″mer, deep water fishing area″, Faroese marrur ″mud, sludge″, Swedish place name element mar-, French mare ″pool, pond″). They derive from reconstituted Proto-Germanic *mari, itself from Indo-European *mori, the same root as marsh and moor. The Indo-European root *mori gave also birth to similar words in other European languages: Latin mare, ″sea″ (Italian mare, Spanish mar, French mer); Old Celtic *mori, ″sea″ (Gaulish mori-, more, Irish muir, Welsh môr, Breton mor); and Old Slavic morje. Signification Windermere, viewed from the north The word once included the sea or an arm of the sea in its range of meaning, but this marine usage is now obso