source: By Lucataxi at Italian Wikipedia, CC BY 3.0

1. a structure or place made or chosen by a bird for laying eggs and sheltering its young.

(鳥･昆虫･小動物の)巣, 巣穴

a place where an insect or other animal breeds or shelters:

e.g. an ants' nest.

a bowl-shaped object likened to a bird's nest:

e.g. arrange in nests of lettuce leaves.

a person's snug or secluded retreat or shelter.

家, すみか; 心地よい［くつろげる］場所, (人目につかず安全な)休息の地, 避難場所

2. a place filled with or frequented by undesirable people or things:

(悪党の)巣窟, 隠れ場, (犯罪の)温床

e.g. a nest of spies.

3. a set of similar objects of graduated sizes, made so that each smaller one fits into the next in size for storage:

入れ子式家具［容器］一式〘小さいものから大きなものへと順に収納可能なもの〙

e.g. a nest of tables.

1. no object (of a bird or other animal) use or build a nest:

〈鳥などが〉 «…に» 巣を作る; 巣ごもりする «in, on»

e.g. the owls often nest in barns

e.g. (as adjective nesting) : do not disturb nesting birds.

2. with object fit (an object or objects) inside a larger one:

〈物が〉 «…に» ぴったりはまる, 入れ子になる «into» .

e.g. the town is nested inside a large crater on the flanks of a volcano.

no object (of a set of objects) fit inside one another:

〈物〉を入れ子にする, 重ね合わせる (!しばしば受け身で)

e.g. Russian dolls that nest inside one another.

(especially in computing and linguistics) place (an object or element) in a hierarchical arrangement, typically in a subordinate position:

e.g. (as adjective nested) : organisms classified in a series of nested sets.

nestful |-ˌfo͝ol| noun (plural nestfuls)

nestlike |-ˌlīk| adjective

Old English, of Germanic origin; related to Latin nidus, from the Indo-European bases of nether (meaning ‘down’) and sit.