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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

nave.

The middle or body of a church, extending from the transepts to the principal entrances.

4 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/neɪv/
  1. The middle or body of a church, extending from the transepts to the principal entrances.

  2. The ground-level middle cavity of a barn.

Where this word comes from

Ultimately from Latin nāvem, singular accusative of nāvis, possibly via a Romance source. Doublet of nef and nau.

noun/neɪv/
  1. A hub of a wheel.

  2. The navel.

    obsolete
Where this word comes from

From Middle English nave, from Old English nafu, from Proto-West Germanic *nabu, from Proto-Germanic *nabō (compare Dutch naaf, German Nabe, Swedish nav), from Proto-Indo-European *h₃nebʰ- (“navel, hub”) (compare Latin umbō (“shield boss”), Latvian naba, Sanskrit नभ्य (nabhya)).

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.