spring [OE] An Old English word that originally referred to the source of a well or stream, the place where a flow of water rises naturally from the earth. People soon started using spring in the context of the first sign or beginning of something—expressions such as ‘the spring of the day’, ‘the spring of the dawn’, and ‘the spring of the year’ were commonly used from around 1380 to 1600. From the middle of the 16th century the last of these expressions became shortened to spring as the name of the first season of the year. Before that this season of new growth had been known as Lent, a word now only used in a religious context to refer to the period of fasting and repentance between Ash Wednesday and Easter, an Old English term of obscure origin. The kind of spring [LME] that is a metal coil is also the same word. This meaning was suggested by the verb sense ‘to come out or jump up suddenly’. Someone who is no spring chicken is not as young as they used to be, a phrase recorded from the mid 19th century. Literal spring chickens were birds born in spring and eaten when they were about 10–15 weeks old.