fens

noun

1. Also called Fenland. a marshy lowland region in E England, S of the Wash: partly drained and channeled since the 17th century.

noun

1. low land covered wholly or partially with water; boggy land; a marsh.
2. the Fens, a marshy region W and S of The Wash, in E England.

noun, plural fen.

1. an aluminum coin and monetary unit of the People’s Republic of China, the hundredth part of a yuan or the tenth part of a jiao.

pl n

1. the Fens a flat low-lying area of E England, west and south of the Wash: consisted of marshes until reclaimed in the 17th to 19th centuries

noun

1. low-lying flat land that is marshy or artificially drained

noun plural fen

1. a monetary unit of the People’s Republic of China, worth one hundredth of a yuan

n.

Old English fenn “mud, mire, dirt; fen, marsh, moor,” from Proto-Germanic *fanjam- (cf. Old Saxon feni, Old Frisian fenne, Middle Dutch venne, Dutch veen, Old High German fenna, German Fenn “marsh,” Old Norse fen, Gothic fani “mud”), from PIE *pen- “swamp” (cf. Gaulish anam “water,” Sanskrit pankah “bog, marsh, mud,” Old Prussian pannean “swampland”). Italian and Spanish fango, Old French fanc, French fange “mud” are loan-words from Germanic. The native Latin word was limus or lutum.