the home and adjacent grounds occupied by a family
"After years of hard work, they finally owned their own homestead where their children could play safely in the garden."
land acquired from the United States public lands by filing a record and living on and cultivating it under the homestead law
"After years of hard work, they finally received their deed to the farm they had built through the homestead process."
dwelling that is usually a farmhouse and adjoining land
"The elderly couple lived in their homestead, which included the red barn and several acres of pastureland."
A house together with surrounding land and buildings, especially on a farm; the property comprising these.
"The elderly couple decided to sell their family homestead after sixty years of tending the fields."
In plain English: A homestead is your family's home and the land it sits on, especially when you own both of them together.
"They decided to buy their own homestead in the countryside."
Usage: Use this noun to describe a farmhouse along with its adjacent fields and outbuildings, particularly in rural settings. When referring to the act of settling such land legally under government programs like the Homestead Act, use it as a verb instead.
settle land given by the government and occupy it as a homestead
"After receiving 160 acres of public land, they packed their wagon to homestead the new territory."
To acquire or settle on land as a homestead.
"After years of working in the city, they decided to homestead on a small plot of land near the river."
In plain English: To homestead means to move onto unowned land and make it your home by living there and working on it.
"They decided to homestead on the empty plot of land in the mountains."
From Middle English hamstede, hemstede (attested in placenames), from Old English hāmstede ("homestead"), from Proto-West Germanic *haimastadi ("homestead"). By surface analysis, home + stead. Cognate with Old Frisian hāmstede, hēmstede ("homestead"), Dutch heemstede ("homestead"), German Heimstatt, Heimstätte ("homestead"), Swedish hemstad ("homestead"), Old Icelandic heimstǫð ("homestead"). Doublet of Hampstead and Hempstead.