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From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.44 [gcide]:
Nativity \Na*tiv"i*ty\, noun; pl. {Nativies}. [F. nativit['e], L. nativitas. See {Native}, and cf. {Na["i]vet['E]}.]
1. The coming into life or into the world; birth; also, the circumstances attending birth, as time, place, manner, etc. --Chaucer.
I have served him from the hour of my nativity. --Shak.
Thou hast left . . . the land of thy nativity. --Ruth ii. 11.
These in their dark nativity the deep Shall yield us, pregnant with infernal flame. --Milton.
2. (Fine Arts) (capitalized) A picture representing or symbolizing the early infancy of Christ. The simplest form is the babe in a rude cradle, and the heads of an ox and an ass to express the stable in which he was born.
3. (Astrol.) A representation of the positions of the heavenly bodies as the moment of one's birth, supposed to indicate one's future destinies; a horoscope.
{The Nativity}, the birth or birthday of Christ; Christmas day.
{To cast one's nativity} or {To calculate one's nativity} (Astrol.), to find out and represent the position of the heavenly bodies at the time of one's birth.
From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:
nativity
noun
1: the event of being born; "they celebrated the birth of their first child" [syn: {birth}, {nascency}, {nascence}] [ant: {death}]
2: the theological doctrine that Jesus Christ had no human father; Christians believe that Jesus's birth fulfilled Old Testament prophecies and was attended by miracles; the Nativity is celebrated at Christmas [syn: {Virgin Birth}]
From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:
62 Moby Thesaurus words for "nativity": aboriginality, accouchement, aspect, astrodiagnosis, astrology, astromancy, autochthonousness, babyhood, beginnings, birth, birth throes, birthing, blessed event, childbearing, childbed, childbirth, childhood, confinement, cradle, delivery, freshman year, genesis, genethliac astrology, genethliacism, genethliacs, genethlialogy, giving birth, hatching, having a baby, horoscope, horoscopy, house, inception, inchoation, incipience, incipiency, incunabula, indigenousness, infancy, labor, mansion, multiparity, mundane astrology, mundane house, nascence, nascency, nationality, native-bornness, nativeness, nativism, natural astrology, origin, origination, parturition, planetary house, pregnancy, stargazing, the Nativity, the stork, travail, youth, zodiac
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