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Clown
Definitions
- 1 A slapstick performance artist often associated with a circus and usually characterized by bright, oversized clothing, a red nose, face paint, and a brightly colored wig.
"Over there in Norway, the churches all burn down / Let's go dress in goth clothes and get painted like a clown"
- 2 a person who amuses others by ridiculous behavior wordnet
- 3 A person who acts in a silly fashion.
"He was regarded as the clown of the school, always playing pranks."
- 4 a rude or vulgar fool wordnet
- 5 A stupid person.
""The dealers snatched at the state of intellectual exhaustion and scepticism of all values that followed the first world war to abolish values and substitute for them an arbitrary mumbo-jumbo of occultism and pseudo-Freudianism, which they tagged on to the works of studio clowns like Picasso and Modigliani and the like.""
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- 6 A man of coarse nature and manners; an awkward fellow; an illbred person; a boor. obsolete
"This loutish clown is such that you never saw so ill - favoured a vizar"
- 7 One who works upon the soil; a rustic; a churl; a yokel. obsolete
"The clown, the child of nature, without guile."
- 8 A clownfish.
"While the tomato clownfish Amphiprion frenatus has been spawned in captivity, wild-caught tomato clowns are more often seen for sale."
- 1 To act in a silly or playful fashion. intransitive
"Except for Rasheena, the rest of the baby mamas was at least struggling to live halfway right. They used to clown and act shitty whenever they came by Noojie's and saw Carmiesha there. But every last one of them ended up being grateful to her for the things she did for their kids."
- 2 act as or like a clown wordnet
- 3 To ridicule, make fun of. transitive
"The show Dismissed was one of my favorites, because I like to see people get clowned."
Etymology
From earlier clowne, cloyne (“man of rustic or coarse manners, boor, peasant”); likely of North Germanic origin, akin to Icelandic klunni (“clumsy fellow, klutz”), Swedish kluns (“clumsy fellow”), all from Middle Low German klunz, from klunt (“pile, lump, something thick”); according to Pokorny, this could be related to a group of Germanic derivatives of Proto-Indo-European *gel- (“to ball up; amass”), such as Proto-West Germanic *klott (“lump”), Proto-Germanic *klūtaz (“clod, lump”), *kultaz (“lump, bundle”), etc. Alternatively, directly from Low German (compare North Frisian klönne (“clumsy fellow, klutz”), Dutch kluns (“clumsy fellow, klutz”), Dutch kloen (“uncouth person, lout”)), themselves from the same ultimate source as above. Unlikely from Latin colōnus (“colonist, farmer”), although learned awareness of this term may have influenced semantic development.
From earlier clowne, cloyne (“man of rustic or coarse manners, boor, peasant”); likely of North Germanic origin, akin to Icelandic klunni (“clumsy fellow, klutz”), Swedish kluns (“clumsy fellow”), all from Middle Low German klunz, from klunt (“pile, lump, something thick”); according to Pokorny, this could be related to a group of Germanic derivatives of Proto-Indo-European *gel- (“to ball up; amass”), such as Proto-West Germanic *klott (“lump”), Proto-Germanic *klūtaz (“clod, lump”), *kultaz (“lump, bundle”), etc. Alternatively, directly from Low German (compare North Frisian klönne (“clumsy fellow, klutz”), Dutch kluns (“clumsy fellow, klutz”), Dutch kloen (“uncouth person, lout”)), themselves from the same ultimate source as above. Unlikely from Latin colōnus (“colonist, farmer”), although learned awareness of this term may have influenced semantic development.
See also for "clown"
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