gre
n. C2 Proficiency UK //ɡɹˈiː// gre
n. a very old word for the color green. You might see it in very old books or poems.
n. a variant spelling of the color green, used primarily in early modern English and archaic literature.
The old manuscript describes the grass as gre.
While modern readers would write 'green', the poet used 'gre' to maintain the traditional rhyme scheme of the ballad.
The scribe's hand was so faded that the word 'gre' appeared almost illegible, yet it was clear enough to identify the color of the forest described in the first stanza.