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nightingale

noun
/ˈnaɪtɪŋɡeɪl/

Etymology

Inherited from Middle English nyghtyngale, nightingale, niȝtingale, alteration (with intrusive n) of nyghtgale, nightegale, from Old English nihtegala, nihtegale (“nightingale; night-raven”, literally “night-singer”), from Proto-West Germanic *nahtigalā (“nightingale”), equivalent to a compound of night + gale. Cognate with Saterland Frisian Noachtegoal (“nightingale”), Dutch nachtegaal (“nightingale”), German Low German Nachtigall (“nightingale”), German Nachtigall (“nightingale”), Danish nattergal (“thrush nightingale”), Swedish näktergal (“nightingale”), Icelandic næturgali (“nightingale”).

  1. inherited from *nahtigalā✻
  2. inherited from nihtegala
  3. inherited from nyghtyngale

Definitions

  1. A Eurasian and African songbird, Luscinia megarhynchos, family Muscicapidae, famed for…

    A Eurasian and African songbird, Luscinia megarhynchos, family Muscicapidae, famed for its beautiful singing at night; a common nightingale.

    • Wilt thou be gone? It is not yet neere day: / It was the Nightingale, and not the Larke, / That pier'ſt the fearefull hollow of thine eare
    • Some admired the external beauties of the objects they beheld, like the nightingale in love with the roſe.
    • The oaks around were the home of a tribe of nightingales.

  2. A kind of flannel scarf with sleeves, formerly worn by invalids when sitting up in bed.

  3. A surname.

    • After the death of his [Verney's] first wife, he proposed to Florence Nightingale but she refused him. Later he married her sister, and for many years Claydon was Miss Nightingale's second home.
  4. ›+ 2 more definitions

    1. A hamlet in Wheatland County, Alberta, Canada, named after Florence Nightingale.

    2. A temporary facility built at short notice during the COVID-19 pandemic, or by extension…

      A temporary facility built at short notice during the COVID-19 pandemic, or by extension any other emergency.

      • In June, the National Education Union wrote to the government, asking it to set up “Nightingale schools”: classrooms in churches, libraries and leisure centres.
      • This scenario would put the NHS under extreme pressure and lead to more non-Covid patients being turned away and use of all available space in Nightingales.
      • In order to create more prison spaces, Farage said his party would spend £5bn to build and operate five new low-security 'Nightingale' prisons on Ministry of Defence land, creating 12,400 spaces for "lower category offenders".

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for nightingale. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

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