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welcome

Pronunciation: /ˈwɛl.kəm/

The English word “welcome” has 10 meanings listed here.

adjective

  1. Whose arrival is a cause of joy; received with gladness; admitted willingly to the house, entertainment, or company.
  2. Producing gladness.
  3. Followed by to: free to have or enjoy gratuitously.

interjection

  1. Greeting given upon someone's arrival.

noun

  1. The act of greeting someone’s arrival, especially by saying "Welcome!"; reception.
  2. The utterance of such a greeting.
  3. Kind reception of a guest or newcomer.
  4. The state of being a welcome guest; a feeling of one's presence and comfort being desired.

verb

  1. To affirm or greet the arrival of someone, especially by saying "Welcome!".
  2. To accept something willingly or gladly.

Etymology

From Middle English welcome, wolcume, wulcume, wilcume, from Old English wilcuma (“a wished-for guest”; compare also wilcume (“welcome!”, interjection)), from Proto-West Germanic *willjakwemō, from Proto-Germanic *wiljakwemô (“a wished-for arrival or guest”), possibly from *wiljakwemaną (“to be welcome”), equivalent to will (“desire”) + come (“comer, arrival”). The component wil- was replaced by…

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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.