What does "nutation" mean?
Nutation: (Astron.) A very small libratory motion of the earth's axis, by which its inclination to the plane of the ecliptic is constantly varying by a small amount.
Additional senses
- 2.(Bot.) (a) The motion of a flower in following the apparent movement of the sun, from the east in the morning to the west in the evening. (b) Circumnutation.
Sources
- Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913 edition (public domain, via GCIDE / Project Gutenberg).
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- Published: 2026-07-17T00:00:00-07:00 · Modified: 2026-07-17T00:00:00-07:00