nursery

noun

1. (broadly, countable, uncountable)A place where nursing (“breastfeeding”) or the raising of children is carried on.

   “As soon as she was alone and the carriage had been driven well away from the door, Mrs. Trevelyan left the drawing-room and went up to the nursery. As she entered she clothed her face with her sweetest smile. "How is his own mother's dearest, dearest, darling duck?" she said, putting out her arms and taking the boy from the nurse.”

   “But they had already discovered that he could be bullied, and they had it their own way; and presently Selwyn lay prone upon the nursery floor, impersonating a ladrone while pleasant shivers chased themselves over Drina, whom he was stalking.”

2. (British, UK, countable, uncountable)A place where nursing (“breastfeeding”) or the raising of children is carried on.
3. (Philippines, countable, uncountable)A place where nursing (“breastfeeding”) or the raising of children is carried on.
4. (also, countable, figuratively)A place where anything is fostered and growth promoted.

   “[S]ince for the great deſire I had To ſee faire Padua, nurſerie of Arts, I am arriu'd for fruitfull Lombardie, The pleaſant garden of great Italy.”

   “Playes are the nurseries of vice, the bawd, / That thorow the senses steales our hearts abroad, / Tainting our eares with obscæne bawdery, / Lascivious words, and wanton ribaulry.”

   “Nudgee College is regarded as the greatest rugby nursery in Queensland, with the boys in the blue-and-white butcher's stripes winning more Greater Public School rugby premierships than any other team.”

5. (also, countable, figuratively, uncountable)A place where anything is fostered and growth promoted.
6. (also, countable, figuratively, uncountable)A place where anything is fostered and growth promoted.

   “Managers of small nurseries may also come into direct contact with the public, who may have complaints about invasive nursery plants or may want varieties that a nursery manager considers invasive. Thus, retail nursery managers have an important role in educating both the consumer public and the wholesale nursery sector in environmental weed issues.”

7. (also, countable, figuratively, uncountable)A place where anything is fostered and growth promoted.
8. (countable)Something which educates and nurtures.

   “Commerce is the nursery of seamen.”

   “The Apoſtles in their travails took ſome choice, and hopeful perſons to accompany them, to Miniſter unto them, and obſerve their waies, who were a kind of ſeminary, or nurſery of Apoſtles, planted, with deſigned ſucceſſors.”

   “[I]n fine, they must consider Christian families as the nurseries of the church on earth, as the church on earth is the nursery of the church in heaven; and thus be brought to bring up youth in the "nurture and admonition of the Lord:" and then we shall have peace; then all will speak the same things, and there will be no divisions among you.”

9. (abbreviation, alt-of, countable, ellipsis)Ellipsis of nursery cannon (“a carom shot involving balls that are very close together”).
10. (countable, obsolete, rare)Someone or something that is nursed; a nursling.
11. (obsolete, uncountable)The act of nursing or rearing.

    “I lou'd her moſt, and thought to ſet my reſt / On her kind nurcery, [...]”