hearth

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. The floor of a fireplace, usually extending into a room and paved with brick, flagstone, or cement.
2. n. Family life; the home.
3. n. Metallurgy The lowest part of a blast furnace or cupola, from which the molten metal flows.
4. n. Metallurgy The bottom of a reverberatory furnace, where ore is exposed to the flame.
5. n. The fireplace or brazier of a blacksmith's forge.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. That part of the floor of a room on which the fire is made, or upon or above which a receptacle for the fire rests: generally a pavement or floor of brick or stone below an opening in the chimney, as in a fireplace. That part of the hearth of a fireplace which is within the limits of the chimney is called the inner hearth; its continuation beyond these limits, as by a slab of stone, is the outer hearth.
2. n. The fireside; the domestic circle; the home.
3. n. In metallurgy: The floor in a reverberatory furnace on which the ore is exposed to the flame. See furnace.
4. n. The lowest part of a blast-furnace, through which the metal descends to the crucible. See furnace.
5. n. A bloomery.
6. n. Nautical, the grate and apparatus for cooking on board ship.
7. n. In soldering: An ordinary brazier or chafing-dish containing charcoal.
8. n. An iron box, about 2 feet by 1 foot 6 inches deep, sunk in the middle of a flat iron plate or table, measuring about 4 feet by 3 feet. It is provided with an airblast, and has a hood above, to gather smoke and gases and carry them to the chimney.
9. n. In glass manufacturing See flattening-hearth.

Wiktionary

1. n. A brick, stone or cement floor to a fireplace or oven.
2. n. An open recess in a wall at the base of a chimney where a fire may be built.
3. n. The lowest part of a metallurgical furnace.
4. n. A symbol for home or family life.
5. n. paganism A household or group following the modern pagan faith of Heathenry.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. The pavement or floor of brick, stone, or metal in a chimney, on which a fire is made; the floor of a fireplace; also, a corresponding part of a stove.
2. n. The house itself, as the abode of comfort to its inmates and of hospitality to strangers; fireside.
3. n. (Metal. & Manuf.) The floor of a furnace, on which the material to be heated lies, or the lowest part of a melting furnace, into which the melted material settles.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. an area near a fireplace (usually paved and extending out into a room)
2. n. home symbolized as a part of the fireplace
3. n. an open recess in a wall at the base of a chimney where a fire can be built