Neighborhood, n.
Etymology: [Written also neighbourhood.]
1. The quality or condition of being a neighbor; the state of being or dwelling near; proximity. Then the prison and the palace were in awful neighborhood. Ld. Lytton.
2. A place near; vicinity; adjoining district; a region the inhabitants of which may be counted as neighbors; as, he lives in my neighborhood.
3. The inhabitants who live in the vicinity of each other; as, the fire alarmed all the neiborhood.
4. The disposition becoming a neighbor; neighborly kindness or good will. [Obs.] Jer. Taylor.
1 more senses
Syn. -- Vicinity; vicinaty; proximity. -- Neighborhood, Vicinity. Neigborhood is Anglo-Saxon, and vicinity is Latin. Vicinity does not commonly denote so close a connection as neighborhood. A neigborhood is a more immediately vicinity. The houses immediately adjoining a square are in the neighborhood of that square; those which are somewhat further removed are also in the vicinity of the square.
Shades of meaning
Fernald has no entry of its own for neighborhood; he lists it under approximation.
Where he writes about it:
Nearness, neighborhood, and propinquity are commonly used of place; approximation, of mathematical calculations and abstract reasoning; we speak of approach to the shore, nearness to the town, approximation to the truth. — from approximation