the meaning is no longer used: an evil being causing bad dreams
Yes. night + mare = nightmare
A night mare is when you have a bad dream or something scarry
Interestingly, the mare in nightmare has nothing to do with a female horse. Instead, it comes from Old English maere 'goblin, incubus.' The word was nigt-mare in 1300, and it referred to an evil female spirit afflicting sleepers with a feeling of suffocation. By 1350, it was nytmare and in 1440 it was nyghte mare. Mare 'goblin' is a cognate with Middle Dutch mare, maer 'incubus,' Old High German mara, Middle High German mar, mare(dialectical modern German Mahr 'nightmlare'), and Old Icelandic mara 'incubus.' Mare comes from the Proto-Germanic word *maron. Nightmare was used to describe 'a bad dream caused by an incubus' in the 16th century, and by 1829 it was used to describe 'a bad dream' in general. From: TakeOurWord.Com
Seas.
A mare is a female horse. Metaphorically, having a bad dream is compared to being on a disobedient horse that carries you where it wants to go, rather than where you want to go. And of course, sleep is usually done at night. Hence night + mare = nightmare.
The ghost haunted the king to be a knight-mare because it's a play on words. "Knight-mare" is a pun on the word "nightmare," implying that the ghost's intention was to give the king bad dreams or haunt him during the night.
Covering your mare is basically just another word for breeding your horse.
Another word for mare would be filly
Yes. Nightmare formerly meant an evil spirit that was supposed to harass or suffocate sleeping people. The word came from two words -- night + Old English mare, which meant an evil spirit. In the late 13th century it meant an evil female spirit afflicting sleepers with a feeling of suffocation. Mare with this meaning is now obsolete in English
most people think cheeky mare is a swear word but it is not
A nightmare (night mare - mare being a female horse)
The word "nightmare" is an Anglo-Saxon word.