mire

6 definitions found

mire - Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 :

  Mire \Mire\ (m[imac]r), n. [AS. m[imac]re, m[=y]re; akin to D.
     mier, Icel. maurr, Dan. myre, Sw. myra; cf. also Ir. moirbh,
     Gr. my`rmhx.]
     An ant. [Obs.] See Pismire.
     [1913 Webster]

  Mire \Mire\, n. [OE. mire, myre; akin to Icel. m?rr swamp, Sw.
     myra marshy ground, and perh. to E. moss.]
     Deep mud; wet, spongy earth. --Chaucer.
     [1913 Webster]
  
           He his rider from the lofty steed
           Would have cast down and trod in dirty mire. --Spenser.
     [1913 Webster]
  
     Mire crow (Zool.), the pewit, or laughing gull. [Prov.
        Eng.]
  
     Mire drum, the European bittern. [Prov. Eng.]
        [1913 Webster]

  Mire \Mire\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Mired (m[imac]rd); p. pr. &
     vb. n. Miring.]
     [1913 Webster]
     1. To cause or permit to stick fast in mire; to plunge or fix
        in mud; as, to mire a horse or wagon.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     2. Hence: To stick or entangle; to involve in difficulties;
        -- often used in the passive or predicate form; as, we got
        mired in bureaucratic red tape and it took years longer
        than planned.
        [PJC]
  
     3. To soil with mud or foul matter.
        [1913 Webster]
  
              Smirched thus and mired with infamy.  --Shak.
        [1913 Webster]

  Mire \Mire\, v. i.
     To stick in mire. --Shak.
     [1913 Webster] Mirific

mire - WordNet (r) 2.1 (2005) :

  mire
      n 1: a soft wet area of low-lying land that sinks underfoot
           [syn: mire, quagmire, quag, morass, slack]
      2: deep soft mud in water or slush; "they waded through the
         slop" [syn: slop, mire]
      3: a difficulty or embarrassment that is hard to extricate
         yourself from; "the country is still trying to climb out of
         the mire left by its previous president"; "caught in the mire
         of poverty"
      v 1: entrap; "Our people should not be mired in the past" [syn:
           entangle, mire]
      2: cause to get stuck as if in a mire; "The mud mired our cart"
         [syn: mire, bog down]
      3: be unable to move further; "The car bogged down in the sand"
         [syn: grind to a halt, get stuck, bog down, mire]
      4: soil with mud, muck, or mire; "The child mucked up his shirt
         while playing ball in the garden" [syn: mire, muck,
         mud, muck up]

mire - Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 :

  112 Moby Thesaurus words for "mire":
     adhere, baygall, befoul, begrime, bemire, bemud, besmirch, besmoke,
     blacken, bog, bog down, bottom, bottomland, bottoms,
     buffalo wallow, cesspool, clay, cleave, cling, cloaca,
     cloaca maxima, cohere, decelerate, defile, detain, dirt, dirty,
     dirty up, drain, dump, dust, embroil, enmesh, ensnare, entangle,
     entrap, everglade, fen, fenland, garbage dump, glade, glop, grime,
     gumbo, gunk, hog wallow, holm, implicate, involve, marais, marish,
     marsh, marshland, meadow, mere, moor, moorland, morass, moss, muck,
     muck up, mud, mud flat, muddy, ooze, peat bog, quag, quagmire,
     quicksand, retard, salt marsh, scum, septic tank, set back, sewer,
     sink, sink in, slab, slacken, slime, slip, slob, slob land, slop,
     slosh, slough, slow down, sludge, slush, smear, smoke, smudge,
     snare, soil, soot, sough, splosh, squash, stick, stodge, sully,
     sump, swale, swamp, swampland, swill, taiga, tangle, tarnish, trap,
     wallow, wash