ban

Etymology 1

From Middle English bannen (“to summon; to banish; to curse”), partly from Old English bannan (“to summon, command, proclaim, call out”), from Proto-West Germanic *bannan; and partly from Old Norse banna (“to prohibit; to curse”), both from Proto-Germanic *bannaną (“to proclaim, to order; to summon; to ban; to curse, forbid”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰh₂-new-ti ~ bʰh₂-n̥w-énti, innovative nasal-infixed zero-grade athematic present of *bʰeh₂- (“to say”). Cognate with Dutch bannen (“to ban, exile, discard”), German bannen (“to exile, to exorcise, captivate, excommunicate”), Swedish banna (“to ban, scold”), Vedic Sanskrit भनति (bhánati), Armenian բան (ban) and perhaps Albanian banoj (“to reside, dwell”). See also banal, abandon.

verb

1. (transitive, obsolete) To summon; to call out.
2. (transitive) To anathematize; to pronounce an ecclesiastical curse upon; to place under a ban.
3. (transitive) To curse; to execrate.
   c. 1555, Hugh Latimer, a sermon They will curse and ban[…]even into the deep pit of hell, all that gainsay their appetite.
4. (transitive) To prohibit; to interdict; to proscribe; to forbid or block from participation.
   To whom the goodly earth and air Are banned 1816, Lord Byron, The Prisoner of Chillon
   Jailing her on Wednesday, magistrate Liz Clyne told Robins: "You have shown little remorse either for the death of the kitten or the trauma to your former friend Sarah Knutton." She was also banned from keeping animals for 10 years. December 14, 2011, Steven Morris, “Devon woman jailed for 168 days for killing kitten in microwave”, in Guardian
   No sooner has a [synthetic] drug been blacklisted than chemists adjust their recipe and start churning out a subtly different one. These “legal highs” are sold for the few months it takes the authorities to identify and ban them, and then the cycle begins again. 2013-08-10, “A new prescription”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8848
   Bare feet are banned in this establishment.
5. (transitive, intransitive) To curse; to utter curses or maledictions.

noun

1. Prohibition.
2. A public proclamation or edict; a summons by public proclamation. Chiefly, in early use, a summons to arms.
   Bans is common and ordinary amongst the Feudists, and signifies a proclamation, or any public notice.
3. The gathering of the (French) king's vassals for war; the whole body of vassals so assembled, or liable to be summoned; originally, the same as arrière-ban: in the 16th c., French usage created a distinction between ban and arrière-ban, for which see the latter word.
   He has sent abroad to assemble his ban and arriere ban.
   The Ban and the Arrierban are met armed in the field to choose a king.
   France was at such a Pinch..that they call'd their Ban and Arriere Ban, the assembling whereof had been long discussed, and in a manner antiquated.
   The ban was sometimes convoked, that is, the possessors of the fiefs were called upon for military services.
   The act of calling together the vassals in armed array, was entitled ‘convoking the ban.
4. (obsolete) A curse or anathema.
5. A pecuniary mulct or penalty laid upon a delinquent for offending against a ban, such as a mulct paid to a bishop by one guilty of sacrilege or other crimes.

Etymology 2

Borrowed from Romanian ban of uncertain origin, perhaps from Serbo-Croatian bân.

noun

1. A subdivision of currency, equal to one hundredth of a Romanian leu.
2. A subdivision of currency, equal to one hundredth of a Moldovan leu.

Etymology 3

From Banburismus; coined by Alan Turing.

noun

1. A unit measuring information or entropy based on base-ten logarithms, rather than the base-two logarithms that define the bit.

Etymology 4

From South Slavic (compare Serbo-Croatian bȃn), from Proto-Slavic *banъ; see there for more.

noun

1. A title used in several states in central and south-eastern Europe between the 7th century and the 20th century.