MOTHER, n. [L. mater, mother; matrix, the womb; materia, matter, stuff, materials of which any thing is made. We observe that in some other languages, as well as in English, the same word signifies a female parent, and the thick slime formed in vinegar; and in all the languages of Europe here cited, the orthography is nearly the same as that of mud and matter. The question then occurs whether the name of a female parent originated in a word expressing matter, mold; either the soil of the earth, as the producer, or the like substance, when shaped and fitted as a mold for castings; or whether the name is connected with the opinion that the earth is the mother of all productions; whence the word mother-earth. We are informed by a fragment of Sanchoniathon, that the ancient Phenicians considered mud to be the substance from which all things were formed. See Mud. The word matter is evidently from the Ar. madda, to secrete, eject or discharge a purulent substance; and I think cannot have any direct connection with mud. But in the Italian, Spanish and Portuguese, the same word madre signified mother, and a mold for castings; and the northern languages, particularly the German and Danish, seem to establish the fact that the proper sense of mother is matrix. Hence mother of pearl, the matrix of pearl. If this word had its origin in the name of the earth used for the forms of castings, it would not be a singular fact; for our word mold, in this sense, I suppose to be so named from mold, fine earth. The question remains sub judice.]

1. Native; natural; received by birth; as, mother-wit.
2. Native; vernacular; received from parents or ancestors; as, mother-tongue.

1. A female parent; especially, one of the human race; a woman who has borne a child; correlative to son or daughter.
2. That which has produced any thing. Alas, poor country, it can not / Be called our mother, but our grave. Shak. So our native land is called mother country, and a plant from which a slip or cion is taken, is called the mother plant. In this use, mother may be considered as an adjective.
3. That which has preceded in time; the oldest or chief of any thing; as, a mother-church.
4. Hysterical passion. [Not used.] Graunt.
5. A familiar term of address or appellation of an old woman or matron.
6. An appellation given to a woman who exercises care and tenderness toward another, or gives parental advice; as, when one says, a "woman has been a mother to me."
7. A thick slimy substance concreted in liquors, particularly in vinegar, very different from scum or common lees.

To concrete, as the thick matter of liquors. Dryden.

To adopt as a son or daughter. Howell.

1. A female parent; especially, one of the human race; a woman who has borne a child.
2. Received by birth or from ancestors; native, natural; as, mother language; also acting the part, or having the place of a mother; producing others; originating.
   
   

   It is the mother falsehood from which all idolatry is derived. T. Arnold.

   Mother cell (Biol.), a cell which, by endogenous divisions, gives rise to other cells (daughter cells); a parent cell. -- Mother church, the original church; a church from which other churches have sprung; as, the mother church of a diocese. -- Mother country, the country of one's parents or ancestors; the country from which the people of a colony derive their origin. - - Mother liquor (Chem.), the impure or complex residual solution which remains after the salts readily or regularly crystallizing have been removed. -- Mother queen, the mother of a reigning sovereign; a queen mother. -- Mother tongue. (a) A language from which another language has had its origin. (b) The language of one's native land; native tongue. -- Mother water. See Mother liquor (above). -- Mother wit, natural or native wit or intelligence.

3. To adopt as a son or daughter] to perform the duties of a mother to.
   
   

   The queen, to have put lady Elizabeth besides the crown, would have mothered another body's child. Howell.

4. A film or membrane which is developed on the surface of fermented alcoholic liquids, such as vinegar, wine, etc., and acts as a means of conveying the oxygen of the air to the alcohol and other combustible principles of the liquid, thus leading to their oxidation.
   
   

   * The film is composed of a mass of rapidly developing microörganisms of the genus Mycoderma, and in the mother of vinegar the microörganisms (Mycoderma aceti) composing the film are the active agents in the Conversion of the alcohol into vinegar. When thickened by growth, the film may settle to the bottom of the fluid. See Acetous fermentation, under Fermentation.

5. To become like, or full of, mother, or thick matter, as vinegar.
6. That which has produced or nurtured anything; source of birth or origin; generatrix.
   
   

   Alas! poor country! . . . it can not
   Be called our mother, but our grave. Shak.

   I behold . . . the solitary majesty of Crete, mother of a religion, it is said, that lived two thousand years. Landor.

7. An old woman or matron.
   
   
   [Familiar]
8. The female superior or head of a religious house, as an abbess, etc.
9. Hysterical passion; hysteria.
   
   
   [Obs.] Shak.

   Mother Carey's chicken (Zoöl.), any one of several species of small petrels, as the stormy petrel (Procellaria pelagica), and Leach's petrel (Oceanodroma leucorhoa), both of the Atlantic, and O. furcata of the North Pacific. -- Mother Carey's goose (Zoöl.), the giant fulmar of the Pacific. See Fulmar. -- Mother's mark (Med.), a congenital mark upon the body; a nævus.