a. [f. FEN sb.1 + -ISH.]
1. = FENNY a.1 1.
1577. B. Googe, Heresbach’s Husb., I. (1586), 24. The land it selfe is … called … fennishe, where the water still continues.
1602. Fulrecke, 2nd Pt. Parall., 54. To turne … fennish ground into firme ground.
1661. Lovell, Hist. Anim. & Min., 145. In Fennish and watery places.
1727. in Bailey, vol. II.
2. Belonging to or produced from a fen. Also of a bird: Inhabiting the fen.
1574. Whitgift, Def. Aunsw., iii. § 30. 378. Therefore is a little water proceeding from a good Fountaine, by stones and Leade kept from things that may hurt it, hardlier putrifyed and corrupted, than all the Fennishe waters in a whole Countrey, than mightie Pooles, yea than the Thames it selfe.
1600. Maides Metam., II. in Bullen, O. Pl., I. 120.
| Where fennish fogges and vapours do abound | |
| There Morpheus doth dwell within the ground. |
1661. Lovell, Hist. Anim. & Min., Introd. 4. Titmouse, great fennish.
1851. College Life Time Jas. I., 63. In the spring of 1619, Symonds fell a victim to the fennish malaria, being seized with ‘a long and sharp tertian ague,’ which proved extremely difficult to shake off. If the old proverb be true, his constitution was no royal one.
3. Savoring of the fen; muddy.
1661. J. Childrey, Brit. Bacon., 88. The Stews … were made to feed Pikes and Tenches fat, and to scour them from their muddy Fennish taste.
