native

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See also: Native

English

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Etymology

Inherited from Middle English natif, from Old French natif, from Latin nātīvus, from nātus (birth). Doublet of naive and neif.

Pronunciation

Adjective

native (comparative more native, superlative most native)

  1. Belonging to one by birth.
    This is my native land.
    English is not my native language.
    I need a volunteer native New Yorker for my next joke…
  2. Characteristic of or relating to people inhabiting a region from prehistoric times.
    What are now called ‘Native Americans’ used to be called Indians.
  3. Alternative letter-case form of Native (of or relating to the native inhabitants of the Americas, or of Australia).
  4. Born or grown in the region in which it lives or is found; not foreign or imported.
    a native inhabitant
    native oysters or strawberries
    Many native artists studied abroad.
  5. (biology, of a species) Which occurs of its own accord in a given locality, to be contrasted with a species introduced by humans.
    The naturalized Norway maple often outcompetes the native North American sugar maple.
  6. (computing, of software) Pertaining to the system or architecture in question.
    This is a native back-end to gather the latest news feeds.
    The native integer size is sixteen bits.
    cloud native, crypto native
  7. (mineralogy) Occurring naturally in its pure or uncombined form.
    native aluminium
    native salt
  8. Arising by birth; having an origin; born.
    1678, R[alph] Cudworth, The True Intellectual System of the Universe: The First Part; wherein All the Reason and Philosophy of Atheism is Confuted; and Its Impossibility Demonstrated, London: Richard Royston, , →OCLC:
    Anaximander's opinion is, that the gods are native, rising and vanishing again in long periods of times.
  9. Original; constituting the original substance of anything.
    native dust
    • 1667, John Milton, “Book X”, in Paradise Lost. , London: [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker ; nd by Robert Boulter ; nd Matthias Walker, , →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: , London: Basil Montagu Pickering , 1873, →OCLC:
      Must I thus leave thee Paradise? thus leave Thee Native Soile, these happie Walks and Shades,
      Fit haunt of Gods?
  10. Naturally related; cognate; connected (with).

Synonyms

Antonyms

Derived terms

Translations

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Noun

native (plural natives)

  1. A person who is native to a place; a person who was born in a place.
  2. (in particular) A person of aboriginal descent, as distinguished from a person who was or whose ancestors were foreigners or settlers/colonizers. Alternative letter-case form of Native (aboriginal inhabitant of the Americas or Australia).
    • 1940 December, O. S. M. Raw, “The Rhodesia Railways—II”, in Railway Magazine, page 640:
      Mail trains are limited to first and second class passengers, but on the mixed trains third class is also provided, and this is patronised exclusively by natives.
    • 2009, Alex M. Cameron, Power without Law: The Supreme Court of Canada, the Marshall Decisions and the Failure of Judicial Activism, McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP, →ISBN:
      Dr John Reid, a historian called to testify for Mr Marshall, distinguished between the fur trade at the truckhouses and a smaller scale trade between natives and settlers: "It seems that there were native persons who were selling small amounts [] "
    • 2013, James Ciment, Another America: The Story of Liberia and the Former Slaves Who Ruled It, Hill and Wang, →ISBN, page 72:
      As for the wars between natives and settlers, far from having “ceased,” they would continue well into the twentieth century, and over much the same things that had always sparked them—trade, land, and settler arrogance.
  3. A native speaker.
  4. Ostrea edulis, a kind of oyster.

Usage notes

Synonyms

Derived terms

Translations

See also

References

  • native”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
  • native in Keywords for Today: A 21st Century Vocabulary, edited by The Keywords Project, Colin MacCabe, Holly Yanacek, 2018.
  • "native" in Raymond Williams, Keywords (revised), 1983, Fontana Press, page 215.
  • native”, in The Century Dictionary , New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.

French

Pronunciation

Adjective

native

  1. feminine singular of natif

Anagrams

Italian

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /naˈti.ve/
  • Rhymes: -ive
  • Hyphenation: na‧tì‧ve

Adjective

native

  1. feminine plural of nativo

Noun

native f pl

  1. plural of nativa

Anagrams

Latin

Pronunciation

Adjective

nātīve

  1. vocative masculine singular of nātīvus

Romanian

Pronunciation

Adjective

native

  1. feminine/neuter plural nominative/accusative of nativ