mere

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   Just, only; no more than, pure and simple, neither more nor better than might be expected.

   The mere thought of pineapple on pizza makes me want to throw up.

2. 2
   adj

   Pure, unalloyed .

   So oft as I this history record, / My heart doth melt with meere compassion[…].

3. 3
   adj

   Nothing less than; complete, downright .

   If every man might have what he would[…]we should have another chaos in an instant, a meer confusion.

4. 4
   noun

   Boundary, limit; a boundary-marker; boundary-line.

   The Troian Brute did first that Citie found, / And Hygate made the meare thereof by West, / And Ouert gate by North: that is the bound / Toward the land; two riuers bound the rest.

5. 5
   verb

   To decide upon the position of a boundary; to position it on a map.

   What chance is there of revising this example of case law to include an exception to the generally cited rule when an administrative boundary has been mered in the past to coincide with a private property boundary?

6. 6
   noun

   A body of standing water, such as a lake or a pond (formerly even a body of seawater), especially a broad, shallow one. (Also included in place names such as Windermere.)

   When making for the Brooke, the Falkoner doth espie On River, Plash, or Mere, where store of Fowle doth lye:

7. 7
   noun

   A Maori war-club.

   As Owen prepared to dismiss the matter, Rule produced something that really caught the great man's eye – a greenstone mere, the warclub of the Maori.

8. 8
   adj

   being nothing more than specified

Etymology

From Middle English mere, mer, from Anglo-Norman meer, from Old French mier, from Latin merus (“pure, unmixed, undiluted”), from Proto-Indo-European *mer- (“to sparkle, gleam”). Cognate with Old English āmerian, āmyrian (“to purify, examine, revise”). The Middle English word was perhaps influenced by or conflated with sound-alike Middle English mere (“glorious, noble, splendid, fine, pure”), from Old English mǣre (“famous, great, excellent, sublime, splendid, pure, sterling”), from Proto-West Germanic *mārī, from Proto-Germanic *mērijaz.