Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The act or an instance of nodding the head.
  • noun A wobble in a spinning gyroscope or other rotating body.
  • noun Astronomy A small periodic irregularity in the precessional motion of the earth's polar axis with respect to the pole of the ecliptic.
  • noun Botany A slight curving or circular movement in a stem, as of a twining plant, caused by variation in growth rates of different parts.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A nodding.
  • noun In pathology, a constant nodding or involuntary shaking of the head.
  • noun In astronomy, a small subordinate gyratory movement of the earth's axis, in virtue of which, if it subsisted alone, the pole would describe among the stars, in a period of about nineteen years, a minute ellipse, having its longer axis directed toward the pole of the ecliptic, and the shorter, of course, at right angles to it.
  • noun In botany, same as circumnutation.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The act of nodding.
  • noun (Astron.) A very small libratory motion of the earth's axis, by which its inclination to the plane of the ecliptic is constantly varying by a small amount.
  • noun The motion of a flower in following the apparent movement of the sun, from the east in the morning to the west in the evening.
  • noun Circumnutation.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun physics a bobbing motion that accompanies the precession of a spinning rigid body
  • noun a nodding motion (of the head etc.)
  • noun astronomy any of several irregularities in the precession of the equinoxes caused by varying torque applied to the Earth by the Sun and the Moon
  • noun botany the circular motion of the tip of a growing shoot

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun uncontrolled nodding

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin nūtātiō, nūtātiōn-, from nūtātus, past participle of nūtāre, frequentative of -nuere, to nod.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

First attested in 1610s. Derived from Latin nutatio, from nūtō ("I nod").

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Examples

  • If, however, the spheres were somewhat flattened at the poles, and the axes inclined to each other, then the pull of one mass on the other would cause the polar axes to keep up a constant movement which is called nutation, or nodding.

    Outlines of the Earth's History A Popular Study in Physiography Nathaniel Southgate Shaler 1873

  • This phenomenon, known as "nutation," was discovered by the beautiful telescopic researches of Bradley, in 1747.

    The Story of the Heavens 1876

  • In addition to this steady decrease, there are also much smaller short term (18.6 years) variations, that is also affected by Sun's gravitation in its depleting angle relative to Earth's, known as nutation.

    Obama near climate change accord with China, others 2009

  • Note that the observed nutation a lunar effect is much larger than the polar motion from the earthquake, so a question he would have to answer is why there is no apparent cycle in temperature from the former.

    Rabett Run EliRabett 2009

  • Amusingly the effect isn't the impressive-sounding nutation at all as a matter of definition, so no amount of calculation saves him from this boo-boo, but rather just plain polar motion.

    Rabett Run EliRabett 2009

  • And now, friends and countrymen, if the wise and learned philosophers of the elder world, the first observers of nutation and aberration, the discoverers of maddening ether and invisible planets, the inventors of Congreve rockets and Shrapnel shells, should find their hearts disposed to enquire what has America done for the benefit of mankind?

    Warning Against Searching for Monsters to Destroy 2008

  • The phenomenon, however, subsequently provided important evidence for Newton's theory of gravity when d'Alembert in 1749 carried out a successful derivation based on rigid body motion and a correct value of the Moon's force derived from the then recently discovered phenomenon of the nutation of the Earth.

    Newton's Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica Smith, George 2007

  • “I believe that if we introduce a more tightly focused nutation cycle in our deflector shields, and channel power to the shield generators directly from the warp engines, we can produce sufficient energy for the shields to protect against contamination of the dilithium crystals.”

    Creative Couplings John S. Drew 2005

  • “I believe that if we introduce a more tightly focused nutation cycle in our deflector shields, and channel power to the shield generators directly from the warp engines, we can produce sufficient energy for the shields to protect against contamination of the dilithium crystals.”

    Creative Couplings John S. Drew 2005

  • “I believe that if we introduce a more tightly focused nutation cycle in our deflector shields, and channel power to the shield generators directly from the warp engines, we can produce sufficient energy for the shields to protect against contamination of the dilithium crystals.”

    Creative Couplings John S. Drew 2005

Comments

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  • I came across this word while reading and thought it must be a typo. But no.

    "...he also possessed uncommon mathematical powers and had read papers on nutation to the Royal Society..."

    --O'Brian, The Wine-Dark Sea, 136

    A Sea of Words defines this term as "A slight oscillation of the earth's axis."

    March 14, 2008

  • So, nothing to do with sternutation, which involves an explosive perturbation of the nasal axis.

    March 14, 2008

  • Hunting rhymes for "nutation" I looked into the legitimacy of "fruitation" and was disappointed to find that what little attention it draws is scorn as an unsophisticated stand-in for "fruition". This is too bad. I like the word and think that it nicely evokes an image of a tree laden with ripened fruit.

    We have a mulberry tree that, at midsummer when its branches droop with the weight of berries, is visited by crowds of birds, squirrels, chipmunks, etc., and cats in pursuit of the wild creatures. Even on windless days the tree pulsates as though palsied. Thus,

    The mulberry tree in fruitation
    Is swayed by a great disputation
    As critters at odds
    Cause tremors and nods
    And days of a steady nutation.

    I think fruitation works just fine here. For that matter nutation could just as well be applied in season to oaks or walnuts to describe both their abundance and their behavior:
    A language improves by mutation
    Producing delights like fruitation,
    Like saplings new-born
    From acorns wind-torn
    From oak trees that bend with nutation.

    August 8, 2016

  • Compare counternutation.

    August 9, 2017

  • "let your backbone slide"

    August 10, 2017