gist
noun
No English definition recorded for this entry.
L16831 on Wikidata ↗Wiktionary
Pronunciation: /d͡ʒɪst/
noun
Etymology: From Middle English giste, geste (“resting or stopping place, hostel, lodgings; food, refreshment; (figurative) seat of the soul”), from Old French giste (“resting place”) (modern French gîte (“lodging, shelter; self-catering holiday home”)), a noun use of the past participle form of gesir (“to lie down”): see etymology 1.
- A stop for lodging or rest in a journey, or the place where this happens; a rest.
“Theſe Quailes have their ſet giſts, to vvit, ordinarie reſting and baiting places.”
“But the Conſul after that he had intelligence that Perſeus had croſſed over to Samothracia, departed from Pella, and at the fourth giſt and journey that he made, came to Amphipolis.”
verb
Etymology: The noun is derived from Old French gist, a noun use of the third person singular indicative of gesir (“to lie down”) (modern French gésir; compare Anglo-Norman (cest) action gist (literally “(law) (this) action lies”)), from Latin iacēre, the present active infinitive of iaceō (“to lie down, lie prostrate, recline”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *(H)yeh₁- (“to throw”) (probably in the sense of something being thrown down). The verb is derived from the noun. The programming sense is a genericized trademark of GitHub Gist, introduced 2008.
- To extract and present the main ideas or substance, or the most essential parts of (a document, piece of writing, etc.); to abridge, to summarize.
“There are two general ways of getting information, and these two general ways may be summed up in this: take one branch of study and its principles are all gisted, they have been gisted by the accumulated thought of years gone by. These gisted thoughts are axioms, or received principles, and the pupils of the day take these axioms or principles, and accept them as facts, and apply them to this, that or the other individual case.”
- To talk idly; chat; also, to gossip.