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night

n. · v.
US //ˈnaɪt// UK //nˈaɪt// night
  1. 1 an evening event (n.)
    A2 Elementary

    an evening spent doing a particular activity or attending an event.

    a period of time during the evening dedicated to a specific social activity or professional event.

    Example

    We are having a movie night at my house this Friday.

    Example

    The university is hosting a careers night to help graduating students network with potential employers in the tech sector.
  2. 2 darkness (n.)
    B2 Upper Intermediate Literary

    the state of being dark, especially when the sun has gone down.

    the quality or state of darkness associated with the absence of sunlight.

    Example

    The thief disappeared into the night before the police arrived.

    Example

    The ancient forest was swallowed by the approaching night, leaving the hikers to rely entirely on their headlamps.
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  1. 3 to stay overnight (v.)
    C2 Proficiency Archaic Dialect

    to stay or sleep somewhere for the night.

    to spend the night at a specific location; to overnight.

    Example

    The travellers decided to night in a small village before continuing their journey.

    Example

    In the old tales, the knight would night at any hospitable cottage he found along the forest path.

    Usage

    This verb is intransitive and rarely used in modern standard English.
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”). Cognates Cognate with Scots nicht (“night”), Yola neeght, nieght, nyeght (“night”), North Frisian naacht, Nacht, noach, nåcht (“night”), Saterland Frisian Noacht (“night”), West Frisian nacht (“night”), Cimbrian, Dutch nacht (“night”), German, Low German Nacht (“night”), Luxembourgish Nuecht (“night”), Mòcheno nòcht (“night”), Vilamovian naocht (“night”), Yiddish נאַכט (nakht, “night”), Danish nat (“night”), Faroese nátt (“night”), Icelandic nátt, nótt (“night”), Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk and Swedish natt (“night”), Scanian nøtt (“night”), Gothic 𐌽𐌰𐌷𐍄𐍃 (nahts, “night”); also Breton noz (“night”), Cornish and Welsh nos (“night”), Irish anocht (“tonight”), Manx noght (“tonight”), Scottish Gaelic a-nochd, an nochd (“tonight”), Latin nox (“night”) (whence English nox, a doublet), Greek νύχτα (nýchta, “night”), Albanian natë (“night”), Latgalian and Latvian nakts (“night”), Lithuanian naktis (“night”), Belarusian ноч (noč, “night”), Bulgarian нощ (nošt, “night”), Czech, Polish, and Slovak noc (“night”), Macedonian ноќ (noḱ, “night”), Russian ночь (nočʹ, “night”), Serbo-Croatian ноћ, noć (“night”), Slovene noč (“night”), Ukrainian ніч (nič, “night”), Tocharian A nakcu (“last night; at night”), Tocharian B nekcīye (“last night; at night”), Hittite 𒉈𒆪𒊻 (nekuz, “evening, nightfall; dawn, twilight”), Sanskrit नक्त् (nákt).

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