Liberal Dictionary English Dictionary
noun
- low land covered wholly or partially with water; boggy land; a marsh.
- the Fens, a marshy region W and S of The Wash, in E England.
noun, plural fen.
- 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.
noun
- low-lying flat land that is marshy or artificially drained
noun plural fen
- a monetary unit of the People’s Republic of China, worth one hundredth of a yuan
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.