English
home
see also: Home
Etymology

From Middle English hōm, from Old English hām, from Proto-West Germanic *haim, from Proto-Germanic *haimaz, from Proto-Indo-European *tḱóymos, from the root *tḱey-.

Germanic cognates: see *haimaz.

Cognate with Irish caoimh, Lithuanian kaimas, šeima ("family"), Albanian komb, Church Slavic сѣмь, Ancient Greek κώμη, from Proto-Indo-European *ḱey- (compare , Ancient Greek κεῖμαι, Latin civis, Avestan 𐬯𐬀𐬉𐬙𐬈, Sanskrit शये).

Pronunciation Noun

home (plural homes)

  1. A dwelling.
    1. One’s own dwelling place; the house or structure in which one lives; especially the house in which one lives with one's family; the habitual abode of one’s family.
      • 1526, [William Tyndale, transl.], The Newe Testamẽt […] (Tyndale Bible), [Worms, Germany: Peter Schöffer], →OCLC ↗, John xx:[10], folio clj, recto ↗:
        And the diſciples went awaye agayne vnto their awne home.
      • 1808, John Dryden, edited by Walter Scott, The Works of John Dryden:
        Thither for ease and soft repose we come: / Home is the sacred refuge of our life; / Secured from all approaches, but a wife.
      • 1822, John Howard Payne, Home! Sweet Home!:
        Home! home! sweet, sweet home! / There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home.
    2. The place (residence, settlement, country, etc.), where a person was born and/or raised; childhood or parental home; home of one’s parents or guardian.
      • 2004, Jean Harrison, Home:
        The rights listed in the UNCRC cover all areas of children's lives such as their right to have a home and their right to be educated.
      Does she still live at home? - No, she moved out and got an apartment when she was 18, but she still lives in the city.
    3. The abiding place of the affections, especially of the domestic affections.
      • 1821, George Gordon Byron, Don Juan‎, canto III:
        He enter’d in the house—his home no more, / For without hearts there is no home; […]
    4. A house that has been made home-like, to suit the comfort of those who live there.
      It's what you bring into a house that makes it a home
    5. A place of refuge, rest or care; an asylum.
      a home for outcasts
      a home for the blind
      a veterans' home
      Instead of a pet store, get your new dog from the local dogs’ home.
    6. (by extension) The grave; the final rest; also, the native and eternal dwelling place of the soul.
      • 1769, King James Bible, Oxford Standard text, Ecclesiastes 12:5:
        […] because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets: […]
    7. (by extension) Anything that serves the functions of a home, as comfort, safety, sense of belonging, etc.
  2. One’s native land; the place or country in which one dwells; the place where one’s ancestors dwell or dwelt.
    • 1863, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Our Old Home: A Series of English Sketches‎:
      Visiting these famous localities, and a great many others, I hope that I do not compromise my American patriotism by acknowledging that I was often conscious of a fervent hereditary attachment to the native soil of our forefathers, and felt it to be our own Old Home.
    • 1908, W[illiam] B[lair] M[orton] Ferguson, chapter IV, in Zollenstein, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC ↗:
      So this was my future home, I thought! Certainly it made a brave picture. I had seen similar ones fired-in on many a Heidelberg stein. Backed by towering hills, […] a sky of palest Gobelin flecked with fat, fleecy little clouds, it in truth looked a dear little city; the city of one's dreams.
    • 1980, Peter Allen, song, I Still Call Australia Home:
      I've been to cities that never close down / From New York to Rio and old London town / But no matter how far or how wide I roam / I still call Australia home.
  3. The locality where a thing is usually found, or was first found, or where it is naturally abundant; habitat; seat.
    the home of the pine
    • 1706, Matthew Prior, An Ode, Humbly Inscribed to the Queen, on the ẛucceẛs of Her Majeẛty's Arms, 1706, as republished in 1795, Robert Anderson (editor), The Works of the British Poets:
      […] Flandria, by plenty made the home of war, / Shall weep her crime, and bow to Charles r'estor'd, […]
    • 1849, Alfred Tennyson, In Memoriam A. H. H.:
      Her eyes are homes of silent prayer, / Nor other thought her mind admits / But, he was dead, and there he sits, / And he that brought him back is there.
  4. A focus point.
    1. (board games) The ultimate point aimed at in a progress; the goal.
      The object of Sorry! is to get all four of your pawns to your home.
    2. (baseball) Home plate.
    3. (lacrosse) The place of a player in front of an opponent’s goal; also, the player.
    4. (Internet) The landing page of a website; the site's homepage.
    5. (music, informal) The chord at which a melody starts and to which it can resolve.
  5. (computers) Clipping of home directory
Synonyms Translations Translations Translations Translations Translations Translations Translations Translations Verb

home (homes, present participle homing; simple past and past participle homed)

  1. (of, animals, transitive) To return to its owner.
    The dog homed.
  2. (always with "in on", transitive) To seek or aim for something.
    The missile was able to home in on the target.
Translations Adjective

home (not comparable)

  1. Of, from, or pertaining to one’s dwelling or country; domestic; not foreign. [from 13th c.]
    home manufactures
  2. (now, rare, except in phrases) That strikes home; direct, pointed. [from 17th c.]
    a home truth
  3. (obsolete) Personal, intimate. [17th–19th c.]
    • 1778, Frances Burney, Journals & Letters, Penguin, published 2001, page 91:
      I hardly knew what I answered him, but, by degrees I tranquillised, as I found he forbore distressing me any further, by such Home strokes […].
  4. (sports) Relating to the home team (the team at whose venue a game is played). [from 19th c.]
    Antonyms: away, road, visitor
    the home end, home advantage, home supporters
Adverb

home (not comparable)

  1. To one's home.
    1. To one's place of residence or one's customary or official location.
      go home
      come home
      carry someone home
      • 1863, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Our Old Home: A Series of English Sketches‎:
        He made no complaint of his ill-fortune, but only repeated in a quiet voice, with a pathos of which he was himself evidently unconscious, "I want to get home to Ninety-second Street, Philadelphia."
      • 1892, Walter Besant, “Prologue: Who is Edmund Gray?”, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC ↗, page 16 ↗:
        Athelstan Arundel walked home all the way, foaming and raging. No omnibus, cab, or conveyance ever built could contain a young man in such a rage. His mother lived at Pembridge Square, which is four good measured miles from Lincoln's Inn.
    2. To one's place of birth.
    3. To the place where it belongs; to the end of a course; to the full length.
      She drove the nail home
      ram a cartridge home
      • c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act V, scene i]:
        Wear thy good rapier bare, and put it home: […]
      • 1988, Roald Dahl, Matilda:
        Eventually she managed to slide the lid of the pencil-box right home and the newt was hers. Then, on second thoughts, she opened the lid just the tiniest fraction so that the creature could breathe.
    4. (internet) To the home page.
      Click here to go home.
  2. At or in one's place of residence or one's customary or official location; at home.
    • 1975-1976, Lou Sullivan, personal diary, quoted in 2019, Ellis Martin, Zach Ozma (editors), We Both Laughed In Pleasure
      I'm certainly not the type to sit home waiting up for hubbie every night.
    Everyone's gone to watch the game; there's nobody home.
    I'm home!
  3. To a full and intimate degree; to the heart of the matter; fully, directly.
    • 1625, Francis Bacon, dedication to the Duke of Buckingham, in Essays Civil and Moral,
      I do now publish my Essays; which of all my other works have been most current : for that, as it seems, they come home to men's business and bosoms.
    • 1692–1717, Robert South, Twelve Sermons Preached upon Several Occasions, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London:
      How home the charge reaches us, has been made out by ẛhewing with what high impudence ẛome amongẛt us defend sin, […]
    • 1748, [Samuel Richardson], “Letter LXVII”, in Clarissa. Or, The History of a Young Lady: […], volume (please specify |volume=I to VII), London: […] S[amuel] Richardson;  […], →OCLC ↗:
      Her treatment of you, you say, does no credit either to her education or fine sense. Very home put, truly!
  4. (UK, soccer) into the goal
    • 2004, Tottenham 4-4 Leicester ↗, BBC Sport: February,
      Walker was penalised for a picking up a Gerry Taggart backpass and from the resulting free-kick, Keane fired home after Johnnie Jackson's initial effort was blocked.
  5. (nautical) into the right, proper or stowed position
    sails sheeted home
Synonyms Related terms Translations Translations
Home
Etymology 1

From home.

Noun

home (uncountable)

  1. (computing) A key that when pressed causes the cursor to go to the first character of the current line, or in a web browser to the top of the web page.
Antonyms Pronunciation
  • (of surname) IPA: /ˈhjuːm/
Proper noun
  1. Surname.
  2. A number of places in USA, all apparently meaning home, a place to live:
    1. An unincorporated community in Franklin, Marshall County.
    2. An unincorporated community in Rayne, Indiana County.
    3. CDP in Pierce County, Washington.
    4. An unincorporated community in Braxton County, West Virginia.


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