Word: season Part of Speech: noun Etymology: From Middle English sesoun, seson (“time of the year”), from Old French seson, saison (“time of sowing, seeding”), from Latin satiō (“act of sowing, planting”) from satum, past participle of serō (“to sow, plant”) from Proto-Indo-European *seh₁- (“to sow, plant”). Akin to Old English sāwan (“to sow”), sǣd (“seed”). Doublet of saison. Displaced native Middle English sele (“season”) (from Old English sǣl (“season, time, occasion”)), Middle English tide (“season, time of year”) (from Old English tīd (“time, period, yeartide, season”)). Pronunciation: [ˈsiː.zn̩], [ˈsi.zn̩], [ˈsɪi.zən] 1. Each of the divisions of a year based on the prevailing weather: spring, summer, autumn (fall) and winter; or the rainy (monsoon) and dry season, depending on the climate. Example: we saw, in six days' traveling, the several seasons of the year in their beauty and perfection Example: We had joy, we had fun, we had seasons in the sun, / But the wine and the song, / like the seasons, have all gone. 2. A period of the year when something particular happens. Example: mating season Example: the football season 3. A period of the year in which a place is most busy or frequented for business, amusement, etc. Example: He seldom was seen in the office himself, but occasionally a paragraph in the paper recorded that his yacht had touched at Mentone and that he had been seen at the Monte Carlo tables, or that he was expected in Leicestershire for the season. 4. A year, but with emphasis on the most important part of the year in context, such as the months when plants or animals grow and reproduce. Labels: metonymically Example: This invasive species reproduces so rapidly that it can completely take over an area in just a couple seasons. 5. The period over which a series of Test matches are played. 6. That which gives relish; seasoning. Labels: obsolete Example: O! she is fallen Into a pit of ink, that the wide sea Hath drops too few to wash her clean again, And salt too little which may season give To her foul-tainted flesh. Example: You lack the season of all natures, sleep. 7. A group of episodes of a television or radio program broadcast in regular intervals with a long break between each group, usually with one year between the beginning of each. Labels: Australia, Canada, US Example: The third season of Robot Chicken aired from 2007 to 2008. Example: Or - is she Erin Gray in the second season of Buck Rogers beautiful? 8. An extended, undefined period of time. Labels: archaic Example: It was the Winter wilde. While the Heav’n-born-childe, All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies: Nature in aw to him Had doff't her gawdy trim, With her great Maſter ſo to ſympathize: It was no ſeaſon then for her To wanton with the Sun her luſty Paramour. Example: So it is in a person when a breach hath been made upon his conscience, quiet, perhaps credit, by his lust, in some eruption of actual sin; — carefulness, indignation, desire, fear, revenge are all set on work about it and against it, and lust is quiet for a season, being run down before them; but when the hurry is over and the inquest is past, the thief appears again alive, and is as busy as ever at his work. 9. A period of time in one’s life characterized by a particular emotion of situation. Example: a season of faithlessness 10. The full set of downloadable content for a game, which can be purchased with a season pass. 11. A fixed period of time in a massively multiplayer online game in which new content (themes, rules, modes, etc.) becomes available, sometimes replacing earlier content.