Vesta
name, noun ·Moderate ·College level
Definitions
- 1 A short match, made of wood or wax.
- 1 The virgin goddess of the hearth, fire, and the household, and therefore a deity of domestic life. The Roman counterpart of Hestia. Roman
- 2 A female given name from Latin in occasional use.
- 3 The fourth asteroid discovered, and second largest, (4) Vesta.
Example
More examples"NASA has launched a probe called Dawn, whose mission is to travel to the asteroid belt. It will first travel to observe the asteroid Vesta. After collecting data from Vesta, Dawn will intercept with Ceres where it will observe its surface features and collect data about its chemical composition."
Etymology
From Middle English Vesta, from Latin Vesta, related to Ancient Greek ἑστία (hestía, “to dwell”) and Ἑστία (Hestía, “Hestia”), all from Proto-Indo-European *h₂wes-; see also Old High German and Old English wesan (“to be”), Gothic wisan, Sanskrit वसति (vasati, “abide dwell”). Vesta itself came to mean chaste, pure, or virgin, based from this goddess.
Named after Vesta, the Roman goddess of fire and the hearth.
Related phrases
More for "vesta"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.