hatch

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See also: Hatch

English[edit]

Pronunciation[edit]

Etymology 1[edit]

Middle English hache, from Old English hæċ, from Proto-Germanic *hakjō (compare Dutch hek ‘gate, railing’, Low German Heck ‘pasture gate, farmyard gate’), variant of *hagjō ‘hedge’. More at hedge.

Noun[edit]

hatch (plural hatches)

  1. A horizontal door in a floor or ceiling.
  2. A trapdoor.
  3. An opening in a wall at window height for the purpose of serving food or other items. A pass through.
    The cook passed the dishes through the serving hatch.
  4. A small door in large mechanical structures and vehicles such as aircraft and spacecraft often provided for access for maintenance.
  5. An opening through the deck of a ship or submarine.
  6. (slang) A gullet.
  7. A frame or weir in a river, for catching fish.
  8. A floodgate; a sluice gate.
    (Can we find and add a quotation of Ainsworth to this entry?)
  9. (Scotland) A bedstead.
    (Can we find and add a quotation of Sir Walter Scott to this entry?)
  10. (mining) An opening into, or in search of, a mine.
Derived terms[edit]
Translations[edit]
trapdoor — see trapdoor

Verb[edit]

hatch (third-person singular simple present hatches, present participle hatching, simple past and past participle hatched)

  1. (transitive) To close with a hatch or hatches.
    • Shakespeare
      'Twere not amiss to keep our door hatched.

Etymology 2[edit]

From Middle English hacchen ‘to propagate’, from Old English hæċċan, āhaċċian (“to peck out; hatch”), cognate with German hecken ‘to breed, spawn’, Danish hække (“to hatch”); akin to Latvian kakale ‘penis’.[1]

Verb[edit]

hatch (third-person singular simple present hatches, present participle hatching, simple past and past participle hatched)

  1. (intransitive) (of young animals) To emerge from an egg.
  2. (intransitive) (of eggs) To break open when a young animal emerges from it.
  3. (transitive) To incubate eggs; to cause to hatch.
  4. (transitive) To devise.
    to hatch a plan or a plot; to hatch mischief or heresy
Derived terms[edit]
Translations[edit]
References[edit]
  1. ^ Wolfgang Pfeifer, ed., Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen, s.v. “hecken” (Munich: Deutscher Taschenbucher Vertrag, 2005).

Noun[edit]

hatch

A radar image of a mayfly hatch on the Mississippi River, 29 May 2010
  1. The act of hatching.
  2. Development; disclosure; discovery.
    • 1603, William Shakespeare, Hamlet:
      There's something in his soul,
      O'er which his melancholy sits on brood;
      I do doubt the hatch and the disclose
      Will be some danger:
  3. (poultry) A group of birds that emerged from eggs at a specified time.
    These pullets are from an April hatch.
  4. (often as mayfly hatch) The phenomenon, lasting 1–2 days, of large clouds of mayflies appearing in one location to mate, having reached maturity.
    • a. 1947, Edward R. Hewitt, quoted in 1947, Charles K. Fox, Redistribution of the Green Drake, 1997, Norm Shires, Jim Gilford (editors), Limestone Legends, page 104,
      The Willowemoc above Livington Manor had the largest mayfly hatch I ever knew about fifty years ago.
    • 2004, Ed Engle, Fishing Small Flies[1], page 118:
      The major application of the parachute is for mayfly hatches, but it's also useful for midge hatches.
    • 2007, John Shewey, On the Fly Guide to the Northwest[2], page 70:
      Many years the mayfly hatch begins by the time the lake opens in April. Otherwise, expect strong hatches by mid-May. The hatches continue through midsummer.
  5. (informal) A birth, the birth records (in the newspaper) — compare the phrase "hatched, matched, and dispatched."
Translations[edit]

Etymology 3[edit]

From Middle French hacher (“to chop, slice up, incise with fine lines”), from Old French hacher, hachier, from Frankish *hakōn, *hakkōn, from Proto-Germanic *hakkōną (“to chop; hack”). More at hack.

Verb[edit]

hatch (third-person singular simple present hatches, present participle hatching, simple past and past participle hatched)

  1. (transitive) To shade an area of (a drawing, diagram, etc.) with fine parallel lines, or with lines which cross each other (cross-hatch).
    • Dryden
      Those hatching strokes of the pencil.
    • Chapman
      Shall win this sword, silvered and hatched.
  2. (transitive, obsolete) To cross; to spot; to stain; to steep.
    • Beaumont and Fletcher
      His weapon hatched in blood.
Translations[edit]
to shade an area — see crosshatch

Further reading[edit]

Anagrams[edit]

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