marshy

Etymology

It is formed from English marsh + -y,^[2][3][4][5] first recorded as Middle English mershi.^[6][4][7] The noun marsh is from Old English mersc, also merisc,^[4][5] from Proto-Germanic *mariskō,^[4][8] probably from *mari (“sea”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of the nature of a marsh; consisting of or containing marshes: before 1382, in the Wycliffite Bible, where seven fat oxen were fed in mershi placez.^[2][6]

Semantic evolution

Chaucer, about 1395, speaks in the Summoner's Tale of "a mersshy contree called Holdernesse" in Yorkshire.^[6][9] From 1595 the adjective was also used of things that grow in or are typical of marshland.^[2][10] Johnson (1755) gave both senses: "boggy; wet; fenny; swampy" and "produced in marshes".^[11] Green's Dictionary of Slang records it in American campus slang of 1960 for seedy or unpleasant.^[12]

Timeline

• before 1382 – of the nature of a marsh, swampy.^[2][6]
• 1595 – found in or characteristic of marshland.^[2][10]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of land, wet and soft like a marsh; swampy or boggy: a marshy meadow by the river.^[13][14][2]
2. Growing in, found in or typical of marshland: marshy reeds.^[14][2]

Word family

• marshiness

Related words

• marsh
• morass
• mere

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
7. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
8. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Germanisches Wörterbuch, 5th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
9. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
10. ^ a b Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
11. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
12. ^ Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
13. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
14. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster