in Germanic cosmology, "the abode of the human race, the world inhabited by men" (opposed to Asgard, the abode of the gods), by 1770, from Old Norse miðgarðr, from mið "mid" (from PIE root *medhyo- "middle") + Proto-Germanic *gardoz "enclosure, tract" (from PIE root *gher- (1) "to grasp, enclose;" compare yard (n.1)). The Old English cognate was middangeard, which later was folk-etymologized as Middle Earth.
