season

Etymology 1

From Middle English sesoun, seson (“time of the year”), from Old French seson, saison (“time of sowing, seeding”), from Latin satiō (“act of sowing, planting”) from satum, past participle of serō (“to sow, plant”) from Proto-Indo-European *seh₁- (“to sow, plant”). Akin to Old English sāwan (“to sow”), sǣd (“seed”). Displaced native Middle English sele (“season”) (from Old English sǣl (“season, time, occasion”)), Middle English tide (“season, time of year”) (from Old English tīd (“time, period, yeartide, season”)).

noun

1. Each of the four divisions of a year: spring, summer, autumn (fall) and winter
   we saw, in six days' traveling, the several seasons of the year in their beauty and perfection c. 1705, Joseph Addison, Remarks on several parts of Italy, &c. in the years 1701, 1702, 1703
   We had joy, we had fun, we had seasons in the sun, / But the wine and the song, / like the seasons, have all gone. 1973, “Seasons in the Sun”, Jaques Brel (original version), Rod McKuen (lyrics), performed by Terry Jacks
2. A part of a year when something particular happens.
   mating season
   the rainy season
   the football season
   Then there came a reg'lar terror of a sou'wester same as you don't get one summer in a thousand, and blowed the shanty flat and ripped about half of the weir poles out of the sand. We spent consider'ble money getting 'em reset, and then a swordfish got into the pound and tore the nets all to slathers, right in the middle of the squiteague season. 1913, Joseph C. Lincoln, chapter 1, in Mr. Pratt's Patients
3. A period of the year in which a place is most busy or frequented for business, amusement, etc.
4. (cricket) The period over which a series of Test matches are played.
5. (obsolete) That which gives relish; seasoning.
6. (Canada, US, Australia, broadcasting) A group of episodes of a television or radio program broadcast in regular intervals with a long break between each group, usually with one year between the beginning of each.
   The third season of Friends aired from 1996 to 1997.
7. (archaic) An extended, undefined period of time.
   So it is in a person when a breach hath been made upon his conscience, quiet, perhaps credit, by his lust, in some eruption of actual sin; — carefulness, indignation, desire, fear, revenge are all set on work about it and against it, and lust is quiet for a season, being run down before them; but when the hurry is over and the inquest is past, the thief appears again alive, and is as busy as ever at his work. 1656, John Owen, The Mortification of Sin
   A season of great doubt fell upon her soul. 1902, John Buchan, The Outgoing of the Tide
8. (video games) The full set of downloadable content for a game, which can be purchased with a season pass.
9. (video games) A fixed period of time in a massively multiplayer online game in which new content (themes, rules, modes, etc.) becomes available, sometimes replacing earlier content.

verb

1. (transitive) To habituate, accustom, or inure (someone or something) to a particular use, purpose, or circumstance.
   to season oneself to a climate
2. (transitive, by extension) To prepare by drying or hardening, or removal of natural juices.
   The timber needs to be seasoned.
3. (intransitive) To become mature; to grow fit for use; to become adapted to a climate.
4. (intransitive) To become dry and hard, by the escape of the natural juices, or by being penetrated with other substance.
   The wood has seasoned in the sun.
5. (transitive) To mingle: to moderate, temper, or qualify by admixture.
6. (obsolete) To impregnate (literally or figuratively).
   When the male hath once seasoned the female he neuer after toucheth her. 1599, “The fift voyage of M. Iohn VVhite into the VVest Indies and parts of America called Virginia, in the yeere 1590”, in Richard Hakluyt, editor, The principal nauigations, voyages, traffiques and discoueries of the English nation
   This prince‥would not suffer the Buls to come unto the Kine and season them, before they were both foure yeares old. 1601, Philemon Holland, The Historie of the World
   If you had seasoned me with that philosophy, which formeth the mind to ratiocination, and insensibly accustoms it to be satisfied with nothing but solid reasons, if you had given me those excellent precepts and doctrines, which raise the foul above the assaults of fortune, and reduce her to an unshakeable and always equal temper, and permit her not to be lifted up b prosperity, nor debased by adversity, if you had taken care to give me the knowledge of what we are, and what are the first principles of things, and had assisted me in forming in my mind a fit idea of the greatness of the universe, and of the admirable order and motion of the parts thereof, if, I say, you had instilled into me this kind of philosophy, I should think myself incomparably more obliged to you than Alexander was to his Aristotle 1745, A Collection of Voyages and Travels, page 150
   In minds, not seasoned and impregnated with the due apprehension of those ends, that conduce to ease and security, there is usually a tempestuous discontent, that raises unruly ferments; an unkind gale, by whose resistless powers, the port is overreached. 1763, Edmund Burton, Antient Characters deduced from Classical Remains, page 82

Etymology 2

From French assaisonner.

verb

1. (transitive) To flavour food with spices, herbs or salt.