barn
UK [ˈbɑːn] · US [ˈbɑɹn] noun, verb, proper noun
Forms barns barning barned
- noun (agriculture) A building, often found on a farm, used for storage or keeping animals such as cattle.
- noun (nuclear physics) A unit of surface area equal to 10⁻²⁸ square metres.
- noun (informal, basketball, ice hockey) An arena. “Maple Leaf Gardens was a grand old barn.”
- noun (slang) A warm and cozy place, especially a bedroom; a roost.
- verb (transitive) To lay up in a barn.
- noun (certain Northern England dialects, otherwise obsolete) A child.
- proper noun A diminutive of the male given names Barney, Barnabas, Barnaby, and Barnett.
- proper noun A unisex given name transferred from the surname; diminutive of Barnard (“surname”).
Synonyms
Etymology
From Middle English barn, bern, bærn, from Old English bearn, bern, contracted forms of Old English berern, bereærn (“barn, granary”), compound of bere (“barley”) and ærn, ræn (“dwelling, barn”), from Proto-West Germanic *raʀn, from Proto-Germanic *razną (compare Old Norse rann), from pre-Germanic *h₁rh̥₁-s-nó-, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁erh₁- (“to rest”).
More at rest and barley.
For the use as a unit of surface area, see w:Barn (unit) § Etymology.
From Middle English barn, bern, from Old English bearn (“child, son, offspring, progeny”) and Old Norse barn (“child”). Doublet of bairn. Cognate to West Frisian bern (“child, children”), Middle Dutch baren (“child”).
Webster’s 1913
- noun A covered building used chiefly for storing grain, hay, and other productions of a farm. In the United States a part of the barn is often used for stables. Barn owl (Zoöl.), an owl of Europe and America (Aluco flammeus, or Strix flammea), which frequents barns and other buildings.
- verb To lay up in a barn. [Obs.] Shak.
- noun A child. [Obs.] See Bairn.
Etymology [OE. bern, AS. berern, bern; bere barley + ern, ærn, a close place. Barley.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “barn”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details