The figure of the moon as it appears in its first or last quarter, with concave and convex edges terminating in points.
Something shaped like a crescent, especially:
A curved pastry.
A curved street, often presenting a continuous façade, as of row houses.
adj.
Crescent-shaped.
Waxing, as the moon; increasing.
[Middle English cressaunt, from Anglo-Norman, variant of Old French creissant, from present participle of creistre, to grow, from Latin crēscere; see ker-2 in Indo-European roots.]
1399, from Anglo-Fr. cressaunt, from O.Fr. creissant, from L. crescentum (nom. crescens), pp. of crescere "come forth, spring up, grow, thrive," from PIE base *ker- "to grow" (cf. L. Ceres, goddess of agriculture, creare "to bring forth, create, produce;" Gk. kouros "boy," kore "girl;" Arm. serem "bring forth," serim "be born"). First applied to the waxing moon, luna crescens, but subsequently mistaken to mean the shape, not the stage. A badge or emblem of the Turkish sultans (probably chosen for its suggestion of "increase"); figurative sense of "Muslim political power" is from 1589, but modern writers often falsely associate it with the Saracens of the Crusades or the Moors of Spain. Horns of the waxing moon are on the viewer's left side; those of the waning moon are on his right. Croissant is the modern Fr. form of the word. The original L. sense is preserved in crescendo, borrowed 1776 as a musical phrase from It., from L. crescendo, abl. of gerund of crescere.
Crescent Beach, FL (CDP, FIPS 15325) Location: 29.73106 N, 81.23880 W Population (1990): 1081 (1553 housing units) Area: 3.9 sq km (land), 0.0 sq km (water) Zip code(s): 34242
Crescent City, CA (city, FIPS 17022) Location: 41.75413 N, 124.19783 W Population (1990): 4380 (1779 housing units) Area: 3.5 sq km (land), 0.7 sq km (water) Zip code(s): 95531
Crescent City, FL (city, FIPS 15375) Location: 29.43826 N, 81.51657 W Population (1990): 1859 (839 housing units) Area: 4.7 sq km (land), 0.8 sq km (water) Zip code(s): 32112
Crescent City, IL (village, FIPS 17406) Location: 40.77147 N, 87.85644 W Population (1990): 541 (248 housing units) Area: 1.3 sq km (land), 0.0 sq km (water) Zip code(s): 60928
Crescent Mills, CA Zip code(s): 95934
Crescent Springs, KY (city, FIPS 18352) Location: 39.05245 N, 84.58025 W Population (1990): 2179 (898 housing units) Area: 3.5 sq km (land), 0.0 sq km (water)
Crescent Park, KY (city, FIPS 18334) Location: 39.04321 N, 84.57626 W Population (1990): 364 (131 housing units) Area: 0.3 sq km (land), 0.0 sq km (water)
Crescent City North, CA (CDP, FIPS 17030) Location: 41.76367 N, 124.21409 W Population (1990): 3853 (1656 housing units) Area: 5.1 sq km (land), 0.0 sq km (water)
Crescent, GA Zip code(s): 31304
Crescent, IA (city, FIPS 17175) Location: 41.36630 N, 95.85880 W Population (1990): 113 (54 housing units) Area: 1.6 sq km (land), 0.0 sq km (water) Zip code(s): 51526
Crescent, MO Zip code(s): 63025
Crescent, OK (city, FIPS 18250) Location: 35.94986 N, 97.58961 W Population (1990): 1236 (663 housing units) Area: 3.4 sq km (land), 0.0 sq km (water) Zip code(s): 73028
Crescent, OR Zip code(s): 97733
La Crescent, MN (city, FIPS 33866) Location: 43.82940 N, 91.30084 W Population (1990): 4311 (1680 housing units) Area: 6.7 sq km (land), 0.8 sq km (water) Zip code(s): 55947
Ac*cres"cent\, a. [L. accrescens, -entis, p. pr. of accrescere; ad + crescere to grow. See Crescent.]1. Growing; increasing. --Shuckford. 2. (Bot.) Growing larger after flowering. --Gray.
Ac*cre"tion\, n. [L. accretio, fr. accrescere to increase. Cf. Crescent, Increase, Accrue.]1. The act of increasing by natural growth; esp. the increase of organic bodies by the internal accession of parts; organic growth. --Arbuthnot. 2. The act of increasing, or the matter added, by an accession of parts externally; an extraneous addition; as, an accretion of earth. A mineral . . . augments not by grown, but by accretion. --Owen. To strip off all the subordinate parts of his as a later accretion. --Sir G. C. Lewis. 3. Concretion; coherence of separate particles; as, the accretion of particles so as to form a solid mass. 4. A growing together of parts naturally separate, as of the fingers toes. --Dana. 5. (Law) (a) The adhering of property to something else, by which the owner of one thing becomes possessed of a right to another; generally, gain of land by the washing up of sand or sail from the sea or a river, or by a gradual recession of the water from the usual watermark. (b) Gain to an heir or legatee, failure of a coheir to the same succession, or a co-legatee of the same thing, to take his share. --Wharton. Kent.
Ac*crue"\, n. [F. accr[^u], OF. acre["u], p. p. of accroitre, OF. acroistre to increase; L. ad + crescere to increase. Cf. Accretion, Crew. See Crescent.] Something that accrues; advantage accruing. [Obs.]
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