Meat

How to spell meat

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce meat

What does meat mean?

1. nounThe flesh of an animal used as food.

Meat in a sentence

• The butcher wrapped the fresh meat in paper.

• She trimmed the fat from the meat before grilling it.

Where does meat come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

The word meat comes from the Old English mete, which meant 'food' in the broadest sense: anything edible, not specifically animal flesh. This is why old phrases like 'meat and drink' and the festival name 'sweetmeat' (a sugary treat, not flesh at all) survive with the older, wider meaning. The same Germanic root appears in related northern languages, and it is unconnected to any sense of measuring or meeting. Over the medieval period the meaning gradually narrowed, so that by the later Middle English period meat increasingly referred to the flesh of animals eaten as food, which is its everyday sense today. The spelling kept its old 'ea' vowel cluster, which now makes it a homophone of 'meet' and 'mete' and a frequent source of slip-ups.

How the word is built

• meat (from Old English mete: food, flesh)

Words that sound like meat

They sound the same but mean different things, so the meaning decides which spelling to write.

• meet: To come into the presence or company of someone, or to come together at a place or time.