Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun The upper part of a glacier where the snow turns into ice.
- noun A snow field at the head of a glacier.
- noun The granular snow typically found in such a field.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun A nephew.
- noun A spendthrift.
- noun A Middle English form of
neaf . - noun Same as
firn. Also glacier-snow . - noun See
næve .
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Geol.) The upper part of a glacier, above the limit of perpetual snow. See
glacier .
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun The
firn orsnowfield at the head of aglacier .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun the upper part of a glacier (beyond the limit of perpetual snow) where the snow turns to ice
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
[French, from French dialectal névi, from Vulgar Latin *nivātum, from neuter of Latin nivātus, cooled by snow, from nix, niv-, snow; see sneigwh- in Indo-European roots.]
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
From the Swiss French term névi, from Latin nix, nivis ("snow").
Support
Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word névé.
Examples
Sorry, no example sentences found.
reesetee commented on the word névé
A young, granular type of snow that's been partially melted, refrozen and compacted. This type of snow is associated with glacier formation through the process of nivation. Névé that survives a full season of ablation is referred to as firn, which is both older and slightly denser. Firn eventually becomes glacial ice.
February 12, 2008