Standard Lemma guide

mese

noun · verb · 3 senses · updated from the 2026-07-25 local source snapshot

Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.

Sound

Pronunciation

Each Play button uses your device's default local English voice, or a natural local fallback. The selected voice name appears after playback. This is synthesized speech, not a source recording.

No pronunciation record was provided for this word.

1

noun

Meaning 1

A dinner; meal.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Usage: obsolete

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

2

noun

Meaning 2

In Ancient Greek musical theory, the highest-pitched fixed note in the nearer tetrachord on a lyre, always pitched a perfect fourth above the hypate, with two movable notes between them, the parhypate (lower in pitch) and the lichanos (higher in pitch). The mese was lower than the paramese (the lower-pitched fixed note in the farther tetrachord on a lyre) by a ratio of 8:9.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Qualifier: musical pitch

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

3

verb

Meaning 3

To moderate; subdue; abate; mollify.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

History

Etymology

From Middle English mese, mes, mees (“dinner, dish”), from Old English mēse, mēose, mīse, mȳse (“table; that which is set on a table; dish; food, meal”), a vernacular loan from Latin/Late Latin mē(n)sa (“table; meal”). Cognate with Scots mes, mese (“a serving of food”), Old High German mias, meas (German Mus, Gemüse), Gothic 𐌼𐌴𐍃 (mēs). Compare Old English mēsan (“to eat, dine”), from Proto-Germanic *mōsijaną, from Proto-Germanic *mōsą, an ablaut variant of the root Proto-Germanic *mat- (“food”).

Unadapted borrowing from Latin mesē, from Ancient Greek μέση (mésē, literally “middle [string]”).

From Middle English mesen, of North Germanic origin. More at meek.