clarion

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English clarioun,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Old French claron, also cleron and clarion,^{[5][6][7][8][2]} and directly borrowed from Medieval Latin clāriō (“trumpet”),^{[6][4][3][9][10]} from Latin clārus (“clear”), the source of clear.^[5][6][3][7] Collins, the Oxford Dictionary of English and Dictionary.com derive it from the Medieval Latin word alone,^[11][10][12] and Weekley preferred that source because the English word seemed older than the French.^[13] The modern form is French clairon.^[7][8] The OED compares Italian clarino and chiarina.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

A trumpet with a narrow tube and a clear, shrill tone, used as a signal in war: before 1338, in Mannyng's Chronicle of England;^[4] Etymonline dates it to the early 14th century.^[6] The OED's first quotation is from Chaucer's House of Fame (about 1384), and the Middle English Dictionary's from the Knight's Tale (about 1385).^[5][2]

Semantic evolution

Chaucer used the word twelve times and Gower once.^[14] Johnson (1755) defined it as "a trumpet; a wind-instrument of war", quoting Spenser's Faerie Queene.^[15] As the instrument went out of use, the word became chiefly poetic or historical.^[5] From Milton's Paradise Lost (1667) it also meant the sound of a trumpet, or any rousing sound like it, such as a cock's crowing,^[5][9] and since about 1670 an organ stop with a trumpet-like tone.^[5] Attributive use, "of or like a clarion, loud and clear", goes back to late Middle English in the Shorter Oxford,^[9] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged dates the adjective to 1801.^[16] The figurative clarion call, a call to battle or action, is recorded from 1838, after clarion's call in 1807.^[6][4] The verb, to blow the clarion, is as old as the noun in the OED (1384), and the transitive sense "to herald with a clarion's sound" dates from 1840.^[5]

Timeline

• before 1338 – a shrill, narrow-tubed war trumpet.^[4] The OED's first record is from about 1384, in Chaucer.^[5]
• 1384 – verb, to blow the clarion.^[5]
• 1667 – the sound of a trumpet, or any rousing sound like it, in Milton.^[5][9]
• c. 1670 – an organ stop with a trumpet-like tone.^[5]
• 1727 – in heraldry, a charge shaped like a clarion.^[5]
• 1801 – adjective, loud and clear.^[16]
• 1838 – clarion call, a call to action.^[6][4]
• 1840 – verb, to herald with a clarion's sound.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. A medieval trumpet with a narrow tube and a clear, shrill tone, used especially as a signal in war.^[16][11][5]
2. The sound of a clarion, or a similar rousing sound.^[16][11][5]
3. A four-foot reed stop of an organ, with a trumpet-like tone.^[11][16][5]
4. (heraldry) A charge shaped like a clarion.^[16][5]

Adjective

1. Loud, clear and stirring: The editorial was a clarion call for reform.^[11][16]
2. Brilliantly clear.^[16]

Verb

1. To proclaim loudly, as if with a clarion.^[11][16][5]
2. To blow a clarion, or give out a sound like one.^[16][5]

Related words

• clear
• clarinet
• clarino

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
4. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
9. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b c d e f Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
12. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
13. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
14. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
15. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
16. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster