nest

noun
/nɛst/

Etymology

From Middle English nest, nist, nyst, from Old English nest, from Proto-West Germanic *nest, from Proto-Germanic *nestą, from Proto-Indo-European *nisdós (“nest”), literally "where [the bird] sits down", a compound of *ni (“down”) (whence also English nether) + the zero-grade of the root *sed- (“to sit”) (whence also English sit).

  1. inherited from *nisdós — “nest
  2. inherited from *nestą
  3. inherited from *nest
  4. inherited from nest
  5. inherited from nest

Definitions

  1. A structure built by a bird as a place to incubate eggs and rear young.

  2. A place used by a monotreme, fish, amphibian or insect, for depositing eggs and hatching…

    A place used by a monotreme, fish, amphibian or insect, for depositing eggs and hatching young.

  3. A snug, comfortable, or cosy residence or job situation.

  4. + 19 more definitions
    1. A retreat, or place of habitual resort.

    2. A hideout for bad people to frequent or haunt

      A hideout for bad people to frequent or haunt; a den.

      • a nest of thieves
      • That nightclub is a nest of strange people!
      • Capt. Kirby and I concluding it might be of great Service to the Eaſt-India Company to deſtroy such a Neſt of Rogues, were ready to ſail for that Purpoſe […]
    3. A home that a child or young adult shares with a parent or guardian.

      • I am aspiring to leave the nest.
    4. A fixed number of cards in some bidding games awarded to the highest bidder allowing him…

      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.
    5. A fortified position for a weapon.

      • a machine gun nest
    6. A structure consisting of nested structures, such as nested loops or nested subroutine…

      A structure consisting of nested structures, such as nested loops or nested subroutine calls.

      • 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.
      • Our analysis to this point has assumed that in a loop nest, we are only parallelizing a single loop.
    7. A circular bed of pasta, rice, etc. to be topped or filled with other foods.

    8. An aggregated mass of any ore or mineral, in an isolated state, within a rock.

    9. A collection of boxes, cases, or the like, of graduated size, each put within the one…

      A collection of boxes, cases, or the like, of graduated size, each put within the one next larger.

    10. A compact group of pulleys, gears, springs, etc., working together or collectively.

    11. The pubic hair near a vulva or a vulva itself.

    12. To build or settle into a nest.

    13. To settle into a home.

      • We loved the new house and were nesting there in two days!
    14. To successively neatly fit inside another.

      • I bought a set of nesting mixing bowls for my mother.
    15. To place in, or as if in, a nest.

    16. 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.
    17. To hunt for birds' nests or their contents (usually "go nesting").

      • After the first heavy frost, when acorns were falling, I took a friend into partnership and went nesting.
    18. A surname from German or Welsh.

    19. Initialism of native English-speaking teacher.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

A definitional loop anchored at nest. Each word in the ring is defined by the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself. Scroll to it and watch.

01nest02eggs03egg04shell05skin06layer07hierarchy08nested

A definitional loop anchored at nest. Each word in the ring appears in the definition of the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself.

8 hops · closes at nest

curated · pre-corpus. live cycle detection across the full graph is the next major milestone.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA