greeting

Pluralgreetings

1. 1
   nouncountable or uncountable

   A set phrase used to begin a letter or conversation, or to acknowledge that someone has arrived or is present.

   She opened the email with a polite greeting before getting to business.

   The doorman offered each arriving visitor a cheerful greeting.

   Similarsalutation, hello, welcome, salute

   Oppositefarewell, goodbye

2. 2
   noununcountable

   The act of welcoming or acknowledging a person on meeting or addressing them.

   Their enthusiastic greeting of the returning soldiers lasted well into the evening.

   The greeting of foreign dignitaries follows a strict diplomatic protocol.

   Similarwelcome, reception, welcoming

   Note

   Here the word names the act itself rather than the words spoken: greet plus -ing, the verb turned into a noun. It sits most naturally in the phrase by way of greeting, as in the American novelist Winston Churchill's The Celebrity (1897), where Farrar smiles "his wonted fraction by way of greeting." Unlike the set phrase itself, this sense takes no plural: you offer greeting, not greetings.

3. 3
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of greet.

   The host was greeting visitors as quickly as they arrived.

   Greeting customers warmly is part of every shift here.

   Note

   Two verbs share this spelling. For the welcoming greet, the -ing form builds progressives (was greeting visitors) and gerunds that still take a direct object (greeting customers warmly). That object is how to tell it from the noun for the act, which needs of: the greeting of dignitaries. In Scotland and Northern England, greet also means to weep, so a greeting child there may simply be crying.

Showing meanings only. Show all 3