lent

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. v. Past tense and past participle of lend.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. An annual fast of forty days, beginning with Ash Wednesday and continuing till Easter, observed from very early times in the Christian church, in commemoration of Christ's forty days' fast (Mat. iv. 2), and as a season of special penitence and preparation for the Easter feast. The lenten fast is now observed as obligatory by the Orthodox Greek and other Oriental churches, and by the Roman Catholic, Anglican, and Lutheran churches, and as a profitable exercise by many members of other churches. It has varied in length at different times and in different parts of the church, and has begun later or earlier according as Sundays only or Saturdays also were excepted from fasting. In the Western Church it begins on Ash Wednesday, forty-six days before Easter; but as the intervening Sundays, called Sundays in (not of) Lent, are (on the ground that Sunday is always a feast-day) not counted part of Lent, the fast lasts only forty days. The first Sunday in Lent is known as Quadragesima Sunday, the fourth as Mid-Lent Sunday, the fifth as Passion Sunday, and the sixth (beginning Holy Week) as Palm Sunday. The two weeks and a half preceding Lent, beginning with Septuagesima, following which are Sexagesima and Quinquagesima Sundays, form the pre-lenten season, a transition between the joyful Christmas and Epiphany season and the penitential season of Lent. In medieval times the name Lent (or, in Latin, Quadragesima) was given to other periods of fasting also. Forty days between Martinmas (November 11th) and Christmas Eve were called St. Martin's Lent (Quadragesima S. Martini), and another Lent preceded St. John Baptist's day (June 24th). In distinction from these, the period between Ash Wednesday and Easter was called Great Lent and Clean Lent, the last name being probably given on account of the preceding confession and absolution. In the Greek Church Lent (Τεσσ, σ1αρακοστή) begins on the Monday after Tyrophagus (Quinquagesima), and the first, third, and sixth Sundays are called Orthodoxy Sunday, Stauroproskynesimos (Sunday of the Adoration of the Cross), and Palm Sunday respectively.
2. n. Preterit and past participle of lend.
3. Slow; gentle; mild.
4. In music, same as lento.
5. n. A suffix in some adjectives of Latin origin, as flatulent, pestilent, pulverulent, turbulent, vinolent, violent, virulent, etc. It is not used in new English formations.

Wiktionary

1. v. Simple past tense and past participle of lend.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. imp. & p. p. of lend.
2. n. (Eccl.) A fast of forty days, beginning with Ash Wednesday and continuing till Easter, observed by some Christian churches as commemorative of the fast of our Savior.
3. adj. obsolete Slow; mild; gentle.
4. adj. (Mus.) See Lento.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. a period of 40 weekdays from Ash Wednesday to Holy Saturday