mell
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /mɛl/
Audio (Southern England): (file) - Rhymes: -ɛl
Etymology 1
From Middle English melen, mælen, from Old English mǣlan (“to speak, talk”), from mǣl (“speech, talk, conversation; dispute, contest, battle”) and māl (“suit, case, action, terms, agreement, covenanted pay”), both from Proto-Germanic *mahlą (“meeting, congress, speech”), alteration of *maþlą (“meeting, congress, speech”), perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *meh₂d- (“to meet, encounter”). Cognate with Scots mele (“to speak, converse, tell”), Danish mæle (“to speak, utter”), Icelandic mæla (“to speak, say”), Old High German mahalōn (“to charge, accuse, proscecute”), German vermählen (“to wed, marry”). More at blackmail.
Alternative forms
Verb
mell (third-person singular simple present mells, present participle melling, simple past and past participle melled)
Noun
mell
Etymology 2
From Middle English mellen, medlen, from Old French meller, mesler (“to mix, mingle”). Doublet of meddle.
Verb
mell (third-person singular simple present mells, present participle melling, simple past and past participle melled)
- (intransitive, obsolete or dialectal) To deal, concern oneself; to interfere or meddle.
- c. 1495, John Skelton, Vppon a deedman's hed:
- For wher so we dwell / Deth wyll us qwell / And with us mell.
- 1579, Immeritô [pseudonym; Edmund Spenser], “Iulye. Ægloga Septima.”, in The Shepheardes Calender: […], London: […] Hugh Singleton, […], →OCLC, folio 29, recto:
- Here is a great deale of good matter, / loſt for lacke of telling, / Now ſicker I see, thou doeſt but clatter: / harme may come of melling.
- 1819 December 20 (indicated as 1820), Walter Scott, chapter II, in Ivanhoe; a Romance. […], volume III, Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co. […], →OCLC, page 57:
- “By Saint Thomas of Kent,” said he, “an I buckle to my gear, I will teach thee to mell with thine own matters, maugre thine iron case there.”
Etymology 3
From Middle English mel, mell, melle, from Latin mell-, mel.[1][2] Doublet of mel.
Noun
mell (uncountable)
- (obsolete) Honey.
- 1586, William Warner, “The Fourth Booke. Chapter XX.”, in Albions England. Or Historicall Map of the Same Island: […], London: […] George Robinson [and R. Ward] for Thomas Cadman, […], →OCLC, page 86:
- Her ſmyles were ſober, and her lookes were chearfull vnto all: / And ſuch as neither wanton ſeeme, noꝛ waward, mell, noꝛ gall.
Etymology 4
Noun
mell (uncountable)
- The last grain cut at harvest; kern
See also
References
- “mell, n.2”, in OED Online
, Oxford: Oxford University Press, launched 2000. - “mel, n.(1)”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.
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