youth

Etymology

From Middle English youthe, youghte, ȝouþe, from Old English ġeoguþ (“the state of being young; youth”), from Proto-West Germanic *juwunþa, from Proto-Germanic *jugunþō, *jugunþiz (“youth”), corresponding to young + -th. Cognate with Saterland Frisian Juugd, West Frisian jeugd, Dutch jeugd, German Low German Jöögd, German Jugend.

noun

1. (uncountable) The quality or state of being young.
   Feel awfully about Scott... It was a terrible thing for him to love youth so much that he jumped straight from youth to senility without going through manhood. The minute he felt youth going he was frightened again and thought there was nothing between youth and age. 1936 Feb. 15, Ernest Hemingway, letter to Maxwell Perkins
   Her youth and beauty attracted him to her.
2. (uncountable) The part of life following childhood; the period of existence preceding maturity or age; the whole early part of life, from childhood, or, sometimes, from infancy, to adulthood.
   Make the most of your youth, it will not last forever.
   I made many mistakes in my youth, but learned from them all.
   Toward the end of the war, Benoit was sent off on his own with forged papers; he wound up working as a horse groom at a chalet in the Loire valley. Mandelbrot describes this harrowing youth with great sangfroid. 2013-01, Brian Hayes, “Father of Fractals”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 1, page 62
3. (countable) A young person.
   There was a group of youths hanging around the parking lot, reading fashion magazines and listening to music.
4. (countable) A young man; a male adolescent or young adult.
5. (uncountable, used with a plural or singular verb) Young persons, collectively.