Paramount (derived from the Anglo-French word paramont, which means up above, or par a mont, meaning up or on top of the mountain) is the highest authority, or that being of the greatest importance. The word was first used as a term of feudal law, of the overlord, the lord paramount, who held his fief from no superior lord, and was thus opposed to mesne lord, one who held from a superior. To those who held their fiefs from one who was not a lord paramount was given the correlative term paravail, (from par d val, meaning in the valley). The word was confused by English lawyers with "avail," help, assistance, profit, and applied to the actual working tenant of the land, the lowest tenant or occupier.