midnight

Pronunciation: /ˈmɪd(ˌ)naɪt/

The English word “midnight” has 4 meanings listed here.

noun

The middle of the night: the sixth temporal hour, equidistant between sunset and sunrise.
Twelve o'clock at night exactly.
Synonym of boxcars (“a pair of sixes”).

adjective

Utterly dark or black.

Etymology

From Middle English midnight, from Old English midniht, from Proto-Germanic *midjanahts (“midnight”), equivalent to mid- + night. Cognate with Saterland Frisian Midnoacht (“midnight”), Old High German mittinaht (“midnight”), Danish midnat (“midnight”), Swedish midnatt (“midnight”), Icelandic miðnætti (“midnight”). Compare also Saterland Frisian Middernoacht (“midnight”), Dutch middernacht…

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