night

Meanings

Noun

• The period between sunset and sunrise, when a location faces far away from the sun, thus when the sky is dark.
• The period of darkness beginning at the end of evening astronomical twilight when the sun is 18 degrees below the horizon, and ending at the beginning of morning astronomical twilight.
• Often defined in the legal system as beginning 30 minutes after sunset, and ending 30 minutes before sunrise.
• An evening or night spent at a particular activity.
• A night (and part of the days before and after it) spent in a place away from home, e.g. a hotel.
• Nightfall.
• Darkness (due to it being nighttime).
• A dark blue colour, midnight blue.
• A night's worth of competitions, generally one game.

Verb

• To spend a night (in a place), to overnight.

Related

Similar words

• sleep
• blackness, darkness, gloom, obscurity, shadow

Opposite words

• brightness, daylight, light

Narrower meaning words

• first night
• last night
• midnight
• tonight
• tomorrow night
• Twelfth Night
• en

Broader meaning words

• 24-hour day

Origin

• From Middle English nighte, night, nyght, niȝt, naht, from Old English niht, from Proto-West Germanic *naht ("night"), from Proto-Germanic *nahts ("night"), from Proto-Indo-European *nókʷts ("night"). Cognate with Scots nicht, neicht, West Frisian nacht ("night"), Dutch nacht ("night"), Low German Nacht ("night"), German Nacht ("night"), Danish nat ("night"), Swedish and Norwegian natt ("night"), Faroese nátt ("night"), Icelandic nótt ("night"), Greek νύχτα ("night"), Russian ночь ("night"), Sanskrit नक्ति ("night"), and Latin nox ("night"), whence English nox, a doublet.