mews

1. a row or street of houses or flats that have been converted from stables or built to look like former stables.

   an eighteenth-century mews

   a mews house

   Eaton Mews

late Middle English: plural of mew², originally referring to the royal stables on the site of the hawk mews at Charing Cross, London. The sense ‘converted dwellings’ dates from the early 19th century.

1. (of a cat or some kinds of bird) make a characteristic high-pitched crying noise.

   cats mewing to be fed

1. the high-pitched crying noise of a cat or bird.

   a kitten's mew

Middle English: imitative.

plural noun

a cage or building for trained hawks, especially while they are moulting.

1. (of a trained hawk) moult.

   the eyasses clung dully to their leashes as if they were mewing

2. confine (a trained hawk) to a cage or building while moulting.

   Raoul orders his tent to be pitched and his hawks to be mewed

late Middle English: from Old French mue, from muer ‘to moult’, from Latin mutare ‘to change’.