Added 1 October 2026
meat
/miːt/ noun
In Latin: carō Wiktionary
noun Definition from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). Pronunciation from Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org. More about meat at Wordnik → Where our words come from →
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The flesh (muscle tissue) of a killed animal used as food. .mw-parser-output .defdate{font-size:smaller}
A large portion of domestic meat production comes from animals raised on factory farms.
- A food designed to replicate its taste and texture (such as plant-based meat).
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A type of meat, by anatomic position and provenance.
The butchery's profit rate on various meats varies greatly.
Origin
Inherited from Middle English mete (“food”), from Old English mete (“food”), from Proto-West Germanic *mati (“food”), from Proto-Germanic *matiz (“food”), from Proto-Indo-European *meh₂d- (“to be wet; grease, fat”). Cognate with North Frisian Miit (“meat”), Danish mad (“food”), Faroese and Icelandic matur (“food, meal”), Norn mader (“food”), Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish mat (“food”), Gothic 𐌼𐌰𐍄𐍃 (mats, “food”). A -ja- derivation from the same base is found in Middle Dutch and Middle Low German met (“lean pork”), from which Dutch met (“minced pork”) and German Mett (“minced meat”) derive, respectively.
From Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org (CC BY-SA)