Nourish

//ˈnʌɹ.ɪʃ// noun, verb

noun, verb ·Moderate ·High school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A nurse. obsolete
Verb
  1. 1
    To feed and cause to grow; to supply with food or other matter which increases weight and promotes health. transitive

    "He planteth an ash, and the rain doth nourish it."

  2. 2
    provide with nourishment wordnet
  3. 3
    To support; to maintain; to be responsible for. transitive

    "I in Ireland nourish a mighty band."

  4. 4
    give nourishment to wordnet
  5. 5
    To encourage; to foster; to stimulate transitive

    "to nourish civility"

Show 4 more definitions
  1. 6
    To cherish; to comfort. transitive

    "Ye have nourished your hearts."

  2. 7
    To educate or bring up; to nurture; to promote emotional, spiritual or other non-physical growth. transitive

    "Nourished up in the words of faith."

  3. 8
    To promote growth; to furnish nutriment. intransitive

    "This type of nourishes very well."

  4. 9
    To gain nourishment. intransitive, obsolete

    "a kingdom may have good limbs, but will have empty veins, and nourish little"

Synonyms

All synonyms
nutrifyabetadvanceaidaid and abetaliment

Example

More examples

"The mother used her own milk to nourish the baby."

Etymology

From Middle English norischen, from Old French nouriss-, stem of one of the conjugated forms of norrir, from Latin nutriō (“to suckle, feed, foster, nourish, cherish, preserve, support”).

Related phrases

nourish a viper in one's bosomwell-nourishedbring up

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.