mermaid

UK/ˈmɜːˌmeɪd//ˈmɝ.meɪd/

mermaid noun: a mythological creature with a woman's head and upper body, and a tail of a fish.

Image: John William Waterhouse, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

mermaid (plural mermaids)

A mythological creature with a woman's head and upper body, and a tail of a fish.
- Search the depth, & ſee that variety of Sea monſters & fiſhes, Mare-maids, Sea men, Horſes, &c. which it affords.1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition 2, section...
- People that are drowned, and whose bodies are not founds are believed to have been taken into the dwellings of the Mermaids.1828, Thomas Keightley, The Fairy Mythology, volume I, London: William Harrison Ainsworth, page 242
Synonyms:

mergirl, merlady, mermaiden, merwoman
Coloured a brilliant turquoise.
- a mermaid smoothie
- mermaid ice-cream
(obsolete) A prostitute.
- A Gentleman or an honeſt Cittizen, ſhall not Sit in your pennie-bench Theaters, vvith his Squirrell by his ſide cracking nuttes; nor ſneake into a Tauerne vvith his Mermaid; but he ſhall be Satyr'd and Epigram'd vpon, and his humour muſt run vpo'th Stage: […]1601 (first performance), Thomas Dekker, Satiro-mastix. Or The Untrussing of the Humorous Poet. […], London: […] [Edward Allde] for Edward White, […], published 1602, →OCLC, signature H2, recto
Synonyms:

hooker, lady of the night, abandons, alley cat, almah, bangtail, Bankside lady, bargirl, bat, beotch

mermaid meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

mermaid in Hindi

mythological woman with a fish’s tail: जलपरी jalparī, मत्स्यांगना matsyāṅgnā

mermaid in Tamil

mythological woman with a fish’s tail: நீர்மங்கை nīrmaṅkai, கடற்கன்னி kaṭaṟkaṉṉi

mermaid in Marathi

mythological woman with a fish’s tail: जलपरी jalaprī, मत्स्यकन्या matsyakanyā

mermaid in Urdu

mermaid: جل پری jal parī

More languagesFewer languages

mermaid in Bengali: মৎস্যকন্যা motsśokonna
mermaid in Telugu: మత్స్యకన్య matsyakanya
mermaid in Malayalam: മത്സ്യകന്യക matsyakanyaka
mermaid in Kannada: ಮೀನುಹೆಣ್ಣು
mermaid in Tagalog: sirena
mermaid in Arabic: خَيَلَان ḵayalān, اِبْنَة الْبَحْر, حُورِيَّة الْبَحْر, عَرُوسَة الْبَحْر
mermaid in Malay: ikan duyung
mermaid in Indonesian: putri duyung
mermaid in Persian: پری دریایی pari-ye daryâyi
mermaid in Thai: นางเงือก naang-ngʉ̂ʉak, เงือก ngʉ̂ʉak
mermaid in Vietnamese: nhân ngư, người cá, mỹ nhân ngư, tiên cá
mermaid in Myanmar: ရေသူမ resuma.
Kashmiri: جل پری jl prī

Examples of mermaid in a sentence

And we don't know what a mermaid actually looks like (or if they even exist).
The lead cecaelia ship left its fleet formation to dock with the main mermaid ship.
Sea monks had failed to assert themselves into the popular imagination the way mermaids had.

All 30 example sentences with mermaid

Synonyms of mermaid

30 more synonymsFewer synonyms

All synonyms of mermaid

Forms of mermaid

plural	mermaids

Plural of mermaid: mermaids

Origin of mermaid

From Middle English mermayde (“maid of the sea”), from mere (“sea, lake”) + maid, equivalent to mer- + maid. Cognate with Dutch meermeid (“mermaid”), Middle High German mermaget, mermeit (“mermaid”, > German Meermagd, Meermädchen (“mermaid”)). Compare Old English meremenn, meremennen, meremenin (“mermaid, siren”).

Words formed from mermaid

Phrases with mermaid

mermaid skirts

Questions about mermaid

What does mermaid mean?: Mermaid means a mythological creature with a woman's head and upper body, and a tail of a fish.
What is mermaid in Hindi?: Mermaid in Hindi is जलपरी (jalparī), मत्स्यांगना (matsyāṅgnā). See Mermaid meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is mermaid?: Mermaid is a noun.
How do you pronounce mermaid?: Mermaid is pronounced /ˈmɜːˌmeɪd/ (UK).
What is the plural of mermaid?: The plural of mermaid is mermaids.

Words near mermaid in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: mermaid (page history and authors); جل پری (Urdu) (page history and authors); മത്സ്യകന്യക (Malayalam) (page history and authors); mermaid (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-us-mermaid.ogg.

Cite this entry: “mermaid.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/mermaid. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.