crèchen.
/kreɪʃ/, /krɛʃ/, U.S. /krɛʃ/ 1. In early use: a crib, a manger (chiefly with reference to the biblical nativity story); cf. crib n. 1a. In later use: a nativity scene, often displayed at Christmas, consisting of a representation of the infant Jesus in the manger, with attending figures; cf. crib n. 1b. Now chiefly North American.
ΘΚΠ
society > leisure > social event > festive occasion > specific festivities > [noun] > festivities associated with Christmas > representation of the Nativity scene > crib
crèche1783
crib1885
1783 M. Berry Jrnl. 25 Nov. (1865) I. 61 Went afterwards to Santa Maria Maggiore, where a piece of the crèche in which our Saviour was born is always exposed..at Christmas.
1792 Wynne Diaries 6 Jan. (1935) I. 97 We..saw at church the Crêche and the three Magi... These images were quite prettily made and amused the children.
1880 M. K. Waddington Let. 10 Mar. in Ital. Lett. (1905) I. 68 We used to go there always on Christmas Eve to see the Crèche and the Bambino.
1903 Westm. Gaz. 29 Dec. 2/1 The shepherds guarding their flocks, the star, and the stable of the inn at Bethlehem are all represented by toy scenery called a ‘crêche’.
1963 G. K. Wilkinson Guinea-pigs xii. 189 Christmas will soon be on us and I hope that you will arrange the Holy Crêche..in the church.
2011 D. Lawrenson Lantern 197 I placed the clay santons, the little saints, around the holy crèche in the hall.
2.
a. A day nursery for infants or young children, now esp. as provided by an employer at a workplace. In later use also: a childcare facility provided for customers at a hotel, shop, gym, etc. Also in extended use. Now chiefly British.In early use chiefly in French contexts. The first crèche was set up in Paris in 1844 by Jean-Baptiste Firmin Marbeau (1798–1875) to provide care for the children of poor women while their mothers were at work; similar institutions were subsequently established elsewhere.
ΘΚΠ
society > education > upbringing > [noun] > nursery
nurseryc1330
farm1842
crèche1846
day nursery1850
day care1975
1846 Galignani's New Paris Guide (new ed.) 99 Crêches, or cradles, are benevolent institutions for the following purpose. Poor women, working out of doors, deposit their babies there in the morning.
1851 F. D. Maurice Let. 24 July in J. F. Maurice Life F. D. Maurice (1884) II. 65 Mrs Maurice hopes you will think about a school for Red Lion Square: she fancies it will be more important than a crèche there.
1871 Graphic 11 Mar. Numbers of poor women are obliged to go out to work leaving their infants either in charge of children scarcely older than themselves, or stupified by some noxious soothing mixture, and it is to protect them from this neglect and misery that the Crèche has been established.
1909 Westm. Gaz. 27 Aug. 3/1 Why on earth should Ireland be treated simply as a crêche for nurturing a superfluity of priests and nuns for the Anglo-Saxon world?
1949 Here & Now (N.Z.) Oct. 17/1 Even..creches, will not lift the load of fatigue from the mother with a sick child to nurse and a teething baby.
1967 Times 21 Sept. (Suppl.) p. vii/4 Children's facilities [on a cruise liner], all of which will be supervised, will include a creche.
1985 Guardian (Nexis) 14 Oct. They have no chance of a state day nursery place, or a workplace creche.
2005 V. Perrett Survive Divorce xxvii. 106 If childcare is a problem then choose a gym with a crèche.
2017 www.iol.co.za (S. Afr.) 21 Sept. (online newspaper, accessed 21 Sept. 2017) The parents of a toddler who died after apparently choking while being fed at a Hammanskraal crèche on Wednesday said they were devastated.
b. A group of juvenile birds or other animals, of different parentage, cared for collectively by one or more parents or unrelated adults. In later use also: an aggregation of juvenile birds, esp. penguins, which have been left without parental care (temporarily or permanently). Frequently attributive.
ΚΠ
1907 E. A. Wilson Aves 49 in National Antarctic Exped. II The huddling together of the chickens which have wandered from their nests is at this stage much encouraged by the old birds, who station a few reliable guardians in a circle round the crèche.
1953 N. Tinbergen Herring Gull's World xxiv. 229 The ‘crèche’ system as found in some penguins.
1986 Auk 103 385/2 Older [Adélie penguin] chicks are left unguarded, and in the absence of adults form creches, the creche stage.
1990 Amer. Naturalist 136 10 Female pride mates with cubs of a similar age pool them together when the cubs are 4–6 weeks old to form a highly stable ‘crèche’.
2011 Independent 2 June 29/1 The chicks..remain in penguin ‘creches’ while the parents go on extending foraging trips at sea.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, September 2014; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1783