>Ordric wrote:
> > I live in the Wreake Valley in Leicestershire,with a high
> >density of Scandinavian place ( and river!!) names.At my workplace it
> >is very common to hear "give us a hand mate,we're mowed out here!"
> >I have never heard the word "Mowed" anywhere else....does anyone know
> >if it is a Norse survival? I have seen the word in Chaucer....but
> >would like to trace it back further.

When you say «give us a hand mate,we're mowed out here!»,
what do you actually mean? Surely you don't mean to say
that "we are 'reaped' out here." ?

There is an Old Norse word "moeddr" = an adjective.
Is it something like that you are looking for?
If you can tell me approximately what it means in
your dialect, I could try to look for an alternative,
though I don't know if I'll find any.

Regards
Keth

>I don't know of a Norse cognate, and I don't have Oxford at hand, but
>here's Merriam-Webster:
>
>Middle English mow, from Old English mAwan; akin to Old High German mAen to
>mow, Latin metere to reap, mow, Greek aman.
>
>Given that Old High German isn't exactly known for its loan words from
>Latin and Greek, I would guess this word is likely of Indo-European origins.