# young

Pronunciation: say "YUNG" /jʌŋ/

## Adjective

1. Having lived or existed for only a short time; in an early stage of life, growth or development.
   - Simple: Not old. Born or started not long ago.
   - _A young calf stayed close to its mother in the pasture._
   - _She was still young when she first learned to swim._
2. Belonging to or characteristic of the early part of life.
   - Simple: Belonging to the early years of a person's life.
   - _She still remembered the thrill of young love: the notes passed in class and the long phone calls at night._
   - _Looking through old photos, he realized how much of his young life had been spent on the baseball field._
3. Having the look or qualities of a young person; youthful.
   - Simple: Looking or acting like a young person, even at an older age.
   - _Her energy and curiosity kept her spirit young into her eighties._
   - _The actor maintained a young appearance well into middle age._
6. Junior; being the younger of two related people who share the same name.
   - Simple: Being the younger of two family members who share the same name.
   - _Young Mr. Carter signs the contracts now that his father has retired._
   - _With two William Harts in the family, the boy was known as young William and his grandfather as old William._
7. Used to express a person's age while playfully implying continued youthfulness, as in 'ninety years young.'
   - Simple: Used to give someone's age in a fun way, hinting that they still seem youthful.
   - _The marathon's oldest finisher was eighty years young._
   - _He likes to say he is sixty-five years young rather than old._
9. In the early years of a given decade of one's life.
   - Simple: In the early years of a ten-year age range, like the early thirties.
   - _Most of the recruits were in their young twenties._
   - _She published her first novel while still in her young forties._

## Noun

4. The offspring of an animal, especially the immature ones.
   - Simple: The babies of an animal, especially ones that are still small.
   - _A wolf will defend its young against any intruder._
   - _Some cichlid mothers keep their young in their mouths, letting them out to feed and taking them back in when danger comes near._
5. People in the early part of life, taken collectively as one group, used with the definite article.
   - Simple: Children and other people early in life, thought of as one group, used after the word the.
   - _The town built a skate park because it had so little to offer the young._
   - _Rising rents have hit the young especially hard in big cities._

## Verb

10. To make something younger or make it appear younger, as by adjusting recorded ages downward; also, of a population, to become younger on average. *(colloquial)*
   - Simple: To make something younger or seem younger, or of a group of people, to become younger on average.

## Adjective

8. Having little experience; inexperienced and unpracticed. *(obsolete)*
   - Simple: Having little experience and not yet skilled at something.

## Other meanings

- (verb) Of a sequence of rock strata, to show a progression toward younger layers in a given direction.

## Origin

"Young" comes from Middle English "yong," from Old English "ġeong," from Proto-Germanic *jungaz and ultimately Proto-Indo-European roots meaning "young." It is related to Dutch "jong," German "jung," and Swedish "ung."

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/young (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).