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Webster 1913 Edition

Nest

Nest

(nĕst)
,
Noun.
[AS.
nest
; akin to D. & G.
nest
, Sw.
näste
, L.
nidus
, for
nisdus
, Skr.
nīḍa
resting place, nest; cf. Lith.
lizdas
, Arm.
neiz
, Gael. & Ir.
nead
. Prob. from the particle
ni
down, Skr.
ni
+ the root of E.
sit
, and thus orig., a place to sit down in. √ 264. See
Nether
, and
Sit
, and cf.
Eyas
,
Nidification
,
Nye
.]
1.
The bed or receptacle prepared by a fowl for holding her eggs and for hatching and rearing her young.
The birds of the air have
nests
.
Matt. viii. 20.
2.
Hence:
The place in which the eggs of other animals, as insects, turtles, etc., are laid and hatched; a snug place in which young animals are reared.
Bentley.
3.
A snug, comfortable, or cozy residence or situation; a retreat, or place of habitual resort; hence, those who occupy a nest, frequent a haunt, or are associated in the same pursuit;
as, a
nest
of traitors; a
nest
of bugs.
A little cottage, like some poor man’s
nest
.
Spenser.
4.
(Geol.)
An aggregated mass of any ore or mineral, in an isolated state, within a rock.
5.
A collection of boxes, cases, or the like, of graduated size, each put within the one next larger.
6.
(Mech.)
A compact group of pulleys, gears, springs, etc., working together or collectively.

Nest

,
Verb.
I.
To build and occupy a nest.
The king of birds
nested
within his leaves.
Howell.

Nest

,
Verb.
T.
To put into a nest; to form a nest for.
From him who
nested
himself into the chief power.
South.

Webster 1828 Edition

Nest

NEST

,
Noun.
1.
The place or bed formed or used by a bird for incubation or the mansion of her young, until they are able to fly. The word is used also for the bed in which certain insects deposit their eggs.
2.
Any place where irrational animals are produced.
3.
An abode; a place of residence; a receptacle of numbers, or the collection itself; usually in an ill sense; as a nest of rogues.
4.
A warm close place of abode; generally in contempt.
5.
A number of boxes, cases or the like, inserted in each other.

NEST

,
Verb.
I.
To build and occupy a nest.
The king of birds nested with its leaves.

Definition 2024

Nest

Nest

See also: nest, NEST, nést, and n'est

German

Noun

Nest n ‎(genitive Nests or Nestes, plural Nester)

  1. nest

Declension

nest

nest

See also: Nest, NEST, nést, and n'est

English

Noun

nest ‎(plural nests)

  1. A structure built by a bird as a place to incubate eggs and rear young.
  2. A place used by another mammal, fish, amphibian or insect, for depositing eggs and hatching young.
  3. A snug, comfortable, or cozy residence or job situation.
  4. A retreat, or place of habitual resort.
  5. A hideout for bad people to frequent or haunt; a den.
    a nest of thieves
    That nightclub is a nest of strange people!
  6. A home that a child or young adult shares with a parent, guardian, or a person acting in the capacity of a parent or guardian. A parental home.
    I am aspiring to leave the nest.
  7. (card games) A fixed number of cards in some bidding games awarded to the highest bidder allowing him to exchange any or all with cards in his hand.
    I was forced to change trumps when I found the ace, jack, and nine of diamonds in the nest.
  8. (military) A fortified position for a weapon, e.g. a machine gun nest.
  9. (computing) A structure consisting of nested structures, such as nested loops or nested subroutine calls.
    • 1981, Donnamaie E. White, Bit-Slice Design: Controllers and ALU's, Garland STPM Press, ISBN 9780824071035, page 49:
      Subroutine 4 cannot jump out of the subroutine nest in one step. Each return address must be popped from the stack in the order in which it was pushed onto the stack.
    • 1993 August, Bwolen Yang et al., "Do&Merge: Integrating Parallel Loops and Reductions", in Languages and Compilers for Parallel Computing (workshop proceedings), Springer (1994), ISBN 978-3-540-57659-4, page 178:
      Our analysis to this point has assumed that in a loop nest, we are only parallelizing a single loop.
  10. A circular bed of pasta, rice, etc. to be topped or filled with other foods.
  11. (geology) An aggregated mass of any ore or mineral, in an isolated state, within a rock.
  12. A collection of boxes, cases, or the like, of graduated size, each put within the one next larger.
  13. A compact group of pulleys, gears, springs, etc., working together or collectively.

Quotations

  • For usage examples of this term, see Citations:nest.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

An olive-backed sunbird (Cinnyris jugularis) nesting in Singapore

nest ‎(third-person singular simple present nests, present participle nesting, simple past and past participle nested)

  1. (intransitive, of animals) To build or settle into a nest.
  2. (intransitive) To settle into a home.
    We loved the new house and were nesting there in two days!
  3. (intransitive) To successively neatly fit inside another.
    I bought a set of nesting mixing bowls for my mother.
  4. (transitive) To place in, or as if in, a nest.
  5. (transitive) To place one thing neatly inside another, and both inside yet another (and so on).
    There would be much more room in the attic if you had nested all the empty boxes.
  6. (intransitive) To hunt for birds' nests or their contents (usually "go nesting").
    • 1895, Alfred Emanuel Smith, Francis Walton
      After the first heavy frost, when acorns were falling, I took a friend into partnership and went nesting.

Translations

Anagrams

See also

Dutch

Pronunciation

  • Rhymes: -ɛst
  • IPA(key): /nɛst/

Etymology

From Middle Dutch nest, from Old Dutch nest, from Proto-Germanic *nestaz. Cognate with English, German Nest etc.

Noun

nest n ‎(plural nesten, diminutive nestje n)

  1. A nest (place to hatch young, especially bird structure; snug residence; retreat; hideout; home)
  2. (colloquial) One's bed
    Kom uit je nest, ’t is hoogste tijd!
    Get out of bed, it’s late!
  3. A nasty, ill-behaving or pretentious girl.
    Wat een verwend nest!
    What a spoiled, pretentious girl!
    De prinses was een verwend nest, tot Zijne Majesteit haar naar een buitenlandse kostschool stuurde waar vervelende nesten van de stok krijgen
    The princess was a spoiled brat, till His Majesty sent her to a foreign boarding school where bitching girls get the cane

Derived terms

Elfdalian

Etymology

From Old Norse næstr, cognate with Swedish näst, English next.

Preposition

nest

  1. by, near

Latgalian

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /nʲesʲtʲ/

Verb

nest

  1. to carry, to bear, to drive, to sweep

Norwegian Bokmål

Etymology

Adverbial form of neste

Adverb

nest

  1. next, second
    nest største - second largest

References

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology

Adverbial form of neste

Adverb

nest

  1. next, second
    nest eldst - second oldest

References

Old English

Pronunciation

  1. A nest

Declension

Descendants

Welsh

Alternative forms

  • gnest
  • gwnest

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /nɛst/

Verb

nest

  1. (colloquial) second-person singular preterite of gwneud

Etymology

From Old High German nest, from Proto-Germanic *nestaz, from Proto-Indo-European *nisdós.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): [nɛst]
  • Rhymes: -ɛst
  • Homophone: nässt

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