Dewfall

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The time of evening when moisture from the air begins to settle as dew on grass, leaves and other surfaces
2. The point at dusk when dew starts gathering on the ground and plants as the air cools
3. The onset of evening dampness when dew first forms on outdoor surfaces after the sun goes down

Etymology: "Dewfall" is a plain compound: "dew" joined to "fall," with "fall" used in its old sense of the descent or coming-on of something, as in nightfall or the fall of evening. Together they name the moment when dew begins to settle on the ground, the evening counterpart to the morning dew that has already formed. The word is formed in English itself rather than borrowed, and it has a close parallel in Danish, "dugfald," which is built from the same two elements in the same order. The pairing shows that the two languages arrived at the same descriptive image independently, or drew on a shared Germanic habit of naming times of day by what happens to the sky or the ground.

Synonyms: dusk, nightfall, evening, sundown

Antonyms: dawn, sunrise