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Eve

//iːv// name, noun

Definitions

Proper Noun
  1. 1
    The first woman and mother of the human race; Adam's wife.

    "And Adam called his wife's name Eve; because she was the mother of all living."

  2. 2
    A conventional name for an agent attempting to intercept a message sent by Alice that is intended for Bob.
  3. 3
    An English surname.
  4. 4
    Alternative spelling of Ewe. alt-of, alternative
  5. 5
    An unspecified primordial woman, from whom many or all people are descended.

    "The Seven Daughters of Eve; Mitochondrial Eve"

Show 3 more definitions
  1. 6
    A female given name from Hebrew.

    ""You were always a cynic," said Edith tolerantly. "I'm sure that Eve will want to have a baby - isn't that why we called her Eve?" "Of course not," said Herbert, as if the baby-cult had long been irritating him. "We called her Eve, or Evelyn, after your grandmother, who was going to leave, and did leave us some money.""

  2. 7
    An unincorporated community in Kentucky, United States.
  3. 8
    An unincorporated community in Missouri, United States.
Noun
  1. 1
    The day or night before, usually used for holidays, such as Christmas Eve.
  2. 2
    Abbreviation of endogenous viral element. abbreviation, alt-of
  3. 3
    the day before wordnet
  4. 4
    Evening, night. archaic, poetic

    "I love to see the shaking twig / Dance till the shut of eve"

  5. 5
    the latter part of the day (the period of decreasing daylight from late afternoon until nightfall) wordnet
Show 2 more definitions
  1. 6
    The period of time when something is just about to happen or to be introduced figuratively

    "the eve of a scientific discovery"

  2. 7
    the period immediately before something wordnet

Etymology

Etymology 1

From a variant of the Middle English noun even (itself from Old English ǣfen), with a pre-1200 loss of the terminal '-n', which was mistaken for an inflection. See also the now archaic or poetic even (“evening”), from the same source. In medieval Europe, days were considered to extend from sunset to sunset rather than midnight to midnight, so the night before a holiday was considered part of it, hence its "eve".

Etymology 2

From Middle English Eve, Eue, from Old English Ēua, Ēfe, from Latin Eva, from Ancient Greek Εὔα (Eúa), from Biblical Hebrew חַוָּה (ḥawwā).

Etymology 3

A pun on eavesdropper.

Etymology 4

Either a variant of Eaves or a matronymic from the given name.

See also for "eve"

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