Other forms: navels
The navel is the small hollow in the middle of the belly. An inny navel, navel piercing, the baby's navel.
It is a scar rather than a feature — where the cord was cut and the stump fell away — which is why every mammal has one and why the shape is decided by healing rather than by inheritance. Navel-gazing means self-absorbed reflection.
navel is a body part.
Old English nafola names the navel, from a Germanic root also behind nave, the hub of a wheel. Both mean a centre.
Proto-Indo-European
*h₃nebʰ-
Proto-Indo-European
*h₃nóbʰōl — navel
Proto-Germanic
*nabalô — navel
Proto-West Germanic
*nabulō
Old English
nafola
Middle English
navel
English, today
navel
Built from
From Middle English navel, navele, from Old English nafola, from Proto-West Germanic nabulō, from Proto-Germanic nabalô (“navel”), from Proto-Indo-European h₃nóbʰōl (“navel”), diminutive of h₃nebʰ- (“hub; navel”). 2 Cognate with West Frisian nâle (“navel”), Dutch navel (“navel”), German Nabel (“navel”), wym nowuł (“navel”), Yiddish נאָפּל (“navel”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål and Norwegian Nynorsk navle (“navel”), Icelandic nafli (“navel”), Swedish navel (“navel”); also Irish imleacán (“navel”), Scottish Gaelic ilmeag, imleag (“navel; nave”), ks ناب (“navel”), Latin umbilīcus (“navel”), Greek αφαλός, ομφαλός (“navel”), prg nabis (“navel”), Armenian անիվ (“wheel”), ckb ناوک (“navel”), Persian ناف (“navel”), Sanskrit नाभि (“navel; centre”),
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA