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hover

Pronunciation: /ˈhɒvə/

The English word “hover” has 12 meanings listed here.

verb

  1. To keep (something, such as an aircraft) in a stationary state in the air.
  2. Of a bird: to shelter (chicks) under its body and wings; (by extension) of a thing: to cover or surround (something).
  3. Of a bird or insect: to flap (its wings) so it can remain stationary in the air.
  4. To remain stationary or float in the air.
  5. Sometimes followed by over: to hang around or linger in a place, especially in an uncertain manner.
  6. To be indecisive or uncertain; to vacillate, to waver.
  7. Chiefly followed by over: to use a mouse or other device to place a cursor over something on a screen such as a hyperlink or icon without clicking, so as to produce a result (such as the appearance of a tooltip).
  8. To travel in a hovercraft as it moves above a water surface.

noun

  1. An act, or the state, of remaining stationary in the air or some other place.
  2. A flock of birds fluttering in the air in one place.
  3. An act, or the state, of being suspended; a suspension.
  4. A cover; a protection; a shelter; specifically, an overhanging bank or stone under which fish can shelter; also, a shelter for hens brooding their eggs.

Etymology

The verb is derived from Middle English hoveren (“to float in the air, hover; to stay”), probably from hoven (“hover; of a bird: to fly high in the air, soar”) (which it displaced) + -er- (frequentative suffix). Hoven is probably derived from Old English *hōfian, from hōfon, the plural past indicative form of hebban (“to lift, raise”), from Proto-West Germanic *habbjan, from Proto-Germanic…

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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.