pen
/pɛn/ noun, verb, proper noun
Also a form of pan
Forms pens penning penned pent the Pen
- noun An enclosure (enclosed area) used to contain domesticated animals, especially sheep or cattle. “There are two steers in the third pen.”
- noun (slang) A penitentiary, i.e. a state or federal prison for convicted felons. “They caught him with a stolen horse, and he wound up in the pen again.”
- noun (baseball) The bullpen. “Two righties are up in the pen.”
- verb (transitive) To enclose in a pen.
- noun A tool, originally made from a feather but now usually a small tubular instrument, containing ink used to write or make marks. “He took notes with a pen.”
- noun (figurative) A writer, or their style. “He has a sharp pen.”
- noun (colloquial) Marks of ink left by a pen. “He's unhappy because he got pen on his new shirt.”
- noun A light pen.
- noun (zoology) The internal cartilage skeleton of a squid, shaped like a pen.
- noun (now rare, poetic, dialectal) A feather, especially one of the flight feathers of a bird, angel etc.
- noun (poetic) A wing.
- noun A syringe-like device for injecting a dose of medication such as insulin or epinephrine. (See Injector pen.)
- verb (transitive) To write (an article, a book, etc.).
- verb (transitive, uncommon) To write or draw on (a surface) with a pen.
- noun A female swan.
- noun (soccer, slang) Penalty. “England won 3-1 on pens.”
- noun (computing, informal) Penetration.
- proper noun A diminutive of the female given name Penelope.
- proper noun The 68th sura (chapter) of the Qur'an.
Synonyms
Etymology
From Middle English pen, penne (“enclosure for animals”), from Old English penn (“enclosure, fold, pen”), from Proto-Germanic *pennō, *pannijō (“pin, bolt, nail, tack”), from Proto-Indo-European *bend- (“pointed peg, nail, edge”). Related to pin.
Sense “prison” originally figurative extension to “enclosure for persons” (1845), later influenced by penitentiary (“prison”), being analyzed as an abbreviation (1884).
From Middle English pennen, from Old English *pennian (“to close, lock, bolt”, attested in onpennian (“to open”)), derived from penn (see above). Akin to Low German pennen (“to secure a door with a bolt”).
From Middle English penne, from Anglo-Norman penne, from Old French penne, from Latin penna (“feather”), from Proto-Indo-European *péth₂r̥ ~ pth₂én- (“feather, wing”), from *peth₂- (“to rush, fly”, whence petition), root of *petra-, whence Ancient Greek πτερόν (pterón, “wing”, whence pterodactyl), and also of Sanskrit पत्रम् (patram, “wing, feather”), Old Church Slavonic перо (pero, “pen”), Old Norse fjǫðr (“feather”), Old English feþer, feðer (Modern English feather); note the /p/ → /f/ Germanic sound change.
Doublet of panne, penna, and pinna. See feather and πέτομαι (pétomai) for more. Not related to pencil.
Origin uncertain. Compare hen.
Webster’s 1913
- noun A feather. [Obs.] Spenser.
- noun A wing. [Obs.] Milton.
- verb To write; to compose and commit to paper; to indite; to compose; as, to pen a sonnet. "A prayer elaborately penned." Milton.
- verb To shut up, as in a pen or cage; to confine in a small inclosure or narrow space; to coop up, or shut in; to inclose. "Away with her, and pen her up." Shak.
Etymology [OE. penne, OF. penne, pene, F. penne, fr. L. penna.]
Etymology [OE. pennen, AS. pennan in on-pennan to unfasten, prob. from the same source as pin, and orig. meaning, to fasten with a peg.See Pin, n. & v.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “pen”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details