MEAT, a word originally applied to food in general, and so still used in such phrases as “meat and drink”; but now, except as an archaism, generally used of the flesh of certain domestic animals, slaughtered for human food by butchers, “butcher’s meat,” as opposed to “game,” that of wild animals, “fish” or “poultry.” Cognate forms of the O. Eng. mete are found in certain Teutonic languages, e.g. Swed. mat, Dan. mad and O. H. Ger. Maz. The ultimate origin has been disputed; the New English Dictionary considers probable a connexion with the root med-, “to be fat,” seen in Sansk. mēda, Lat. madere, “to be wet,” and Eng. “mast,” the fruit of the beech as food for pigs.
See Dietetics; Food Preservation; Public Health; Agriculture; and the sections dealing with agricultural statistics under the names of the various countries.