marsh

C2+ Topic:General Vocabulary

US /mɑɹʃ/ UK /mɑː(ɹ)ʃ/ See IPA manual

Minimal pairs

Sounds like march /tʃ/ vs /ʃ/ Sounds like March /tʃ/ vs /ʃ/

Freq #6326

Meanings

1

noun
low wet land, often with grasses or reeds

The path disappeared into the marsh at dusk.

Thesaurus

Synonyms

1 noun · low wet land, often with... wetland swamp fen bog

More mire

Word family

Forms marshy

Derived forms marshesmarshymarshland

Related forms waterlandwetlands

Appears in

Phrases (3)

See all

Etymology

From Middle English merssh, from Old English mersċ, merisċ, from Proto-West Germanic *marisk, related to mere ("pool, lake") and meaning wet, low ground.

merssh Middle English mersċ Old English *marisk Proto-West Germanic

View etymology graph ->

Topics

General Vocabulary

External links

# marsh

**Type:** Word
**Level:** C2+
**Part of speech:** noun
**IPA (US):** /mɑɹʃ/
**IPA (UK):** /mɑː(ɹ)ʃ/
**Frequency rank:** 6326

## Meanings
1. low wet land, often with grasses or reeds

## Examples
- The path disappeared into the marsh at dusk.

## Synonyms
- wetland
- swamp
- fen
- bog
- mire

## Derived Forms
- marshes
- marshy
- marshland

## Related Forms
- waterland
- wetlands

## Roots and Affixes
- Root: merssh
- Root: mersċ
- Root: *marisk

## Etymology
From Middle English merssh, from Old English mersċ, merisċ, from Proto-West Germanic *marisk, related to mere ("pool, lake") and meaning wet, low ground.

## AI Etymology
Marsh comes from Middle English merssh, from Old English mersċ or merisċ, ultimately from a West Germanic form related to mere, a pool or lake. In current use it means low, wet ground, often grassy or reedy, between open water and dry land. The etymology explains the sense directly: the word names land defined by standing water. Related words such as marshy and marshland keep the same environmental core, while the headword remains the concrete noun for the wet place itself.

## Topics
- General Vocabulary

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