- published: 07 May 2016
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North is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography. It is one of the most important directions.
North is one of the four cardinal directions or compass points. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west.
By convention, the top side of a map is north.
To go north using a compass for navigation, set a bearing or azimuth of 0° or 360°.
North is specifically the direction that, in Western culture, is treated as the fundamental direction:
The word north is related to the Old High German nord, both descending from the Proto-Indo-European unit ner-, meaning "down" (or "under"). (Presumably a natural primitive description of its concept is "to the left of the rising sun".)
Latin borealis is from Greek boreas "north wind, north", in mythology (according to Ovid) personified as the son of the river-god Strymon, and father of Calais and Zetes; septentrionalis is from septentriones, "the seven plow oxen", a name of Ursa Maior. Greek arktikos "northern" is named for the same constellation (cf. Arctic).