SUMMER

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does summer mean? 

• SUMMER (noun)
  The noun SUMMER has 2 senses:

1. the warmest season of the year; in the northern hemisphere it extends from the summer solstice to the autumnal equinox

2. the period of finest development, happiness, or beauty

  Familiarity information: SUMMER used as a noun is rare.

• SUMMER (verb)
  The verb SUMMER has 1 sense:

1. spend the summer

  Familiarity information: SUMMER used as a verb is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• SUMMER (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The warmest season of the year; in the northern hemisphere it extends from the summer solstice to the autumnal equinox

Classified under:

Nouns denoting time and temporal relations

Synonyms:

summer; summertime

Context example:

they spent a lazy summer at the shore

Hypernyms ("summer" is a kind of...):

season; time of year (one of the natural periods into which the year is divided by the equinoxes and solstices or atmospheric conditions)

Meronyms (parts of "summer"):

June 21; midsummer; summer solstice (June 21, when the sun is at its northernmost point)

canicular days; canicule; dog days (the hot period between early July and early September; a period of inactivity)

Derivation:

summer (spend the summer)

summerize (prepare for summer)

summery (belonging to or characteristic of or occurring in summer)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The period of finest development, happiness, or beauty

Classified under:

Nouns denoting time and temporal relations

Context example:

the golden summer of his life

Hypernyms ("summer" is a kind of...):

time of life (a period of time during which a person is normally in a particular life state)

Domain usage:

figure; figure of speech; image; trope (language used in a figurative or nonliteral sense)

• SUMMER (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they summer    ... he / she / it summers   
Past simple: summered   
Past participle: summered   
-ing form: summering   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Spend the summer

Classified under:

Verbs of being, having, spatial relations

Context example:

We summered in Kashmir

Hypernyms (to "summer" is one way to...):

pass; spend (use up a period of time in a specific way)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s
Somebody ----s PP

Derivation:

summer (the warmest season of the year; in the northern hemisphere it extends from the summer solstice to the autumnal equinox)

 Context examples 

I am exceedingly obliged to you, Mrs. Elton, I am obliged to any body who feels for me, but I am quite serious in wishing nothing to be done till the summer.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

I have seen a stronger fortalice carried in a summer evening.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Uranus is now approaching the middle of its summer season, and the polar-cap region is becoming more prominent.

(Hubble Reveals Dynamic Atmospheres of Uranus, Neptune, NASA)

Because snow and ice reflect more light than vegetation or water, the spring is brighter than the summer or autumn, when there is much less snow and ice.

(Earthshine, NASA)

A great wind rises, and the summer is gone in a moment.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

It was in the summer that White Fang arrived at Fort Yukon.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

In the summer Rose-red took care of the house, and every morning laid a wreath of flowers by her mother’s bed before she awoke, in which was a rose from each tree.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

Did he see you last summer or autumn, 'somewhere down in the west,' to use her own words, without knowing it to be you?

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)

No, I could not have Charlington Hall for the summer.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

It is a cold night, and I observe that your circulation is more adapted for summer than for winter.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)