quagmire

English

WOTD – 7 June 2016
A quagmire or swamp in Louisiana, United States

Etymology

Recorded since 1579, from two virtual synonyms: obsolete English quag (“bog, marsh”) (a variant of Middle English quabbe (“bog, marsh”), from Old English *cwabba (“shake, tremble like something soft and flabby”); cognate with Dutch kwab) + mire (from Middle English, from Old Norse mýrr, akin to Old English mōs (“marsh”) and English moss). The sense “perilous, mixed up and troubled situation” has been recorded since 1775.[1]

Alternatively, the word may apparently be a variation of the earlier quakemire, from quake + mire.[2]

Pronunciation

Noun

quagmire (plural quagmires)

  1. A swampy, soggy area of ground.
    That quagmire regularly ‘swallows’ caught-up hikers' boots
    Synonyms: marsh, marshland, mire, quag
  2. (figuratively) A perilous, mixed up and troubled situation; a hopeless tangle; a predicament.
    The paperwork got lost in a quagmire of bureaucracy.
    Those election results are a quagmire for any coalition except one of national union

Translations

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Verb

quagmire (third-person singular simple present quagmires, present participle quagmiring, simple past and past participle quagmired)

  1. (transitive) To embroil (a person, etc.) in complexity or difficulty.

References

  1. ↑ “quagmire” in Douglas Harper, Online Etymology Dictionary, 2001–2018.
  2. ↑ quagmire in The Century Dictionary, The Century Co., New York, 1911.
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