horn

Etymology

From Middle English horn, horne, from Old English horn, from Proto-West Germanic *horn, from Proto-Germanic *hurną. Compare West Frisian hoarn, Dutch hoorn, Low German Hoorn, horn, German Horn, Danish and Swedish horn, Gothic 𐌷𐌰𐌿𐍂𐌽 (haurn). Ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ḱr̥h₂-nó-m, from *ḱerh₂- (“head, horn”). Compare Breton kern (“horn”), Latin cornū, Ancient Greek κέρας (kéras), Proto-Slavic *sьrna, Old Church Slavonic сьрна (sĭrna, “roedeer”), Hittite [script needed] (surna, “horn”), Persian سر (sar), Sanskrit शृङ्ग (śṛṅga, “horn”). (telephone): From the horn-shaped earpieces of old communication systems that used air tubes.

noun

1. (countable) A hard growth of keratin that protrudes from the top of the head of certain animals, usually paired.
2. Any similar real or imaginary growth or projection such as the elongated tusk of a narwhal, the eyestalk of a snail, the pointed growth on the nose of a rhinoceros, or the hornlike projection on the head of a demon or similar.
   But nowhere are there queerer waters than in our own parish of Caulds, at the place called the Sker Bay, where between two horns of land a shallow estuary receives the stream of the Sker. 1902, John Buchan, The Outgoing of the Tide
3. An antler.
4. (uncountable) The hard substance from which animals' horns are made, sometimes used by man as a material for making various objects.
   an umbrella with a handle made of horn
5. An object whose shape resembles a horn, such as cornucopia, the point of an anvil, or a vessel for gunpowder or liquid.
   1. The high pommel of a saddle; also, either of the projections on a lady's saddle for supporting the leg.
   2. (architecture) The Ionic volute.
   3. (nautical) The outer end of a crosstree; also, one of the projections forming the jaws of a gaff, boom, etc.
   4. (carpentry) A curved projection on the fore part of a plane.
   5. One of the projections at the four corners of the Jewish altar of burnt offering.
6. (countable) Any of several musical wind instruments.
7. (countable, music) An instrument resembling a musical horn and used to signal others.
   hunting horn
8. (countable, automotive) A loud alarm, especially one on a motor vehicle.
9. (chiefly sports) A sound signaling the expiration of time.
   The shot was after the horn and therefore did not count.
10. (countable) A conical device used to direct waves.
    antenna horn
    loudspeaker horn
11. (informal, music, countable) Generally, any brass wind instrument.
12. (slang, countable) A telephone.
    Get him on the horn so that we can have a discussion about this.
13. (uncountable, vulgar, slang, definite article) An erection of the penis.
14. (countable, geography) A peninsula or crescent-shaped tract of land.
    to navigate around the horn
15. (countable) A diacritical mark that may be attached to the top right corner of the letters o and u when writing in Vietnamese, thus forming ơ and ư.
16. (botany) An incurved, tapering and pointed appendage found in the flowers of the milkweed (Asclepias).
17. (military) In naval mine warfare, a projection from the mine shell of some contact mines which, when broken or bent by contact, causes the mine to fire.

verb

1. (transitive, of an animal) To assault with the horns.
2. (transitive) To furnish with horns.
3. (transitive, slang, obsolete) To cuckold.