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meed: msg#00014

culture.language.word-of-the-day

Subject: meed

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The Word of the Day for November 15 is:

meed \MEED\ noun
: a fitting return or recompense

Example sentence:
For his valor displayed on the field of battle, the knight
was rewarded with his due meed of praise and gratitude from the
king.

Did you know?
The word "meed" is one of the oldest terms in our language,
having been part of English for about 1,000 years. An early form
of the word appeared in the Old English classic _Beowulf_, and
it can be found in works by literary luminaries including
Geoffrey Chaucer, Edmund Spenser, John Milton, Alexander Pope,
and Ben Jonson. Its Old English form, "med," is akin to terms
found in the ancestral versions of many European languages,
including Old High German, Old Swedish, and ancient Greek. In
Modern English, the venerable "meed" is most likely to be found
in poetic contexts.







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