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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

nesh.

Soft; tender; sensitive; yielding.

4 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

adj/nɛʃ/
  1. Soft; tender; sensitive; yielding.

    UK · dialectal
  2. Delicate; weak; poor-spirited; susceptible to cold weather, harsh conditions etc.

    UK · dialectal
  3. Soft; friable; crumbly.

    UK · dialectal
Where this word comes from

From Middle English nesh, nesch, nesche, from Old English hnesċe, hnysċe, næsċe (“soft, tender, mild; weak, delicate; slack, negligent; effeminate, wanton”), from Proto-West Germanic *hnaskwī, from Proto-Germanic *hnaskuz (“soft, tender”), from Proto-Indo-European *knēs-, *kenes- (“to scratch, scrape, rub”). Cognate with Scots nesch, nesh (“soft, tender, yielding easily to pressure, sensitive”), Dutch nesch, nes (“wet, moist”), Gothic 𐌷𐌽𐌰𐍃𐌵𐌿𐍃 (hnasqus, “soft, tender, delicate”). Compare also nask, nasky, nasty.

verb/nɛʃ/
  1. To make soft, tender, or weak.

    transitive
  2. To act timidly.

    Northern-England · dialectal · intransitive
Where this word comes from

From Middle English neschen, from Old English hnesċan, hnesċian (“to make soft, soften; become soft, give way, waver”), from Proto-West Germanic *hnaskwōn (“to make soft”), from Proto-Indo-European *knēs-, *kenes- (“to scratch, scrape, rub”). Cognate with Old High German nascōn ("to nibble at, parasitise, squander"; > German naschen (“to nibble, pinch”)). Doublet of nosh.

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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.