▪ I. clown, n.
(klaʊn)
Also 6 cloune, cloine, cloyne.
[Appears in Eng. in second half of 16th c. as cloyne or cloine, and clowne. The phonetic relation between these is difficult to understand; the former is esp. obscure: possibly a dialect form. By Dunbar, the word (if indeed the same) is written cloun; but it rimes with tone, Joun, meaning tune, June, both having in Sc. the sound ({smY} or {obar}), which would imply (kl{smY}n). Words identical or closely related appear in several of the cognate langs. and dialects: e.g. NFris. (Moringer dial.) ‘klönne (or klünne) ‘clumsy lout, lumpish fellow’ (Bendsen):—OFris. type *klunda wk. masc. Cf. NFris. insular dial. Amrum klünj (pl. klünjar) ‘clod, clot, lump’ = Sylt klünd ‘clog, wooden mall’:—OFris. type *klund str. masc. Also mod.Icel. klunni:—*klunþi ‘clumsy boorish fellow’ (Vigf.), ‘en klods, ubehændig person’ (Jonson), compared with Sw. dial. klunn, kluns (Rietz) ‘clump, clog, log’, and Da. dial. klunds = klods ‘block, log, stump’, also ‘clown’. In Dutch also, Sewell (1766) has kleun fem. (marked as a ‘low word’) ‘a hoidon or lusty bouncing girl’, kloen n. with same sense; and he explains Eng. clown as ‘een plompe boer, kinkel, kloen’. Bilderdijk Verklarende Geslachtlijst (1832) says that kloen applied to a man signifies een lompert, ‘clown’ in English, and so is it with klont, kluit, and kluts or klots, all meaning primarily ‘clod, clot, lump’. So far as concerns the sense-development, then, it is clear that we have here a word meaning originally ‘clod, clot, lump’, which like these words themselves (see clod 5, clot 4), has been applied in various langs. to a clumsy boor, a lout. Of an OE. type, corresp. to the Fris., or to the Du. words, we have no trace, no more than of the occurrence in Eng. of the primitive sense ‘clod’; and it is probable that in Eng. the word is of later introduction from some Low German source.]
1. A countryman, rustic, or peasant.
| 1563 Baldwin Mirr. Mag., Rivers xliv, The cloyne contented can not be With any state. 1567 Turberv. Poems, Agst. Ielous Heads, etc. (R.), To brag vpon his pipe the clowne begoon..And then to blow the rustick did assay. 1570 Levins Manip. 219/44 A cloune, rusticus. 1587 Mirr. Mag., Madan xi, The clowne that driues the mixen Cart. a 1640 Earl Stirling Sonn. xxiv. (R.), She [viper] kil'd the courteous clowne by whom she liu'd. 1662 Fuller Worthies ii. 177 Clown from Colonus, one that plougheth the ground. 1784 Cowper Task iv. 623 The clown, the child of nature, without guile. 1848 Macaulay Hist. Eng. I. 610 The Somersetshire clowns, with their scythes..faced the royal horse like old soldiers. |
b. Implying ignorance, crassness, or rude manners: A mere rustic, a boor.
| 1565 Golding Ovid's Met. (1593) To Rdr. 6 The wise, the foole: the countrie cloine: the learned and the lout. 1646 F. Hawkins Youth's Behavior vii. §16 (1663) 32 Put not thy meat in thy mouth, holding thy knife in thy hands, as do the Countrey Clowns. 1733 Cheyne Eng. Malady iii. Introd. (1734) 262 A clod-pated Clown. 1848 Macaulay Hist. Eng. I. 320 Language..such as we should now expect to hear only from the most ignorant clowns. |
2. transf. A man without refinement or culture; an ignorant, rude, uncouth, ill-bred man.
| 1583 Golding Calvin on Deut. lxxxvii. 538 Euen such as haue beene counted the simplest Cloynes. 1697 Evelyn Numism. viii. 288 Every rich Clown..who was able to be at the Charges of a Stamp. 1850 Tennyson In Mem. cxi, The churl in spirit..By blood a king, at heart a clown. 1881 Besant & Rice Chaplain Fleet i. iii, How could a courtly gentleman..have a son who was so great a clown in his manner and his talk. |
3. A fool or jester, as a stage-character (? orig. representing a rustic buffoon), or (in Shakespeare) a retainer of a court or great house; b. in mod. use, one of the characters in a pantomime or harlequinade; also a similar character in a circus.
| [1500–20 Dunbar Quhy will ȝe, merchantis 31 Cuningar men man serve Sanct Cloun.] 1600 Rowlands Let. Humours Blood Sat. iv. 63 What meanes Singer then? And Pope the Clowne, to speake so Boorish, when They counterfaite the Clownes vpon the Stage? Ibid. Epigr. xxx. (1874) 36 When Tarlton clown'd it in a pleasant vaine Vpon the Stage, his merry humors shop, Clownes knew the Clowne, by his great clownish slop. 1600 Shakes. A.Y.L. ii. ii. 8 The roynish Clown, at whom so oft Your Grace was wont to laugh. 1602 ― Ham. ii. ii. 336 The Clowne shall make those laugh whose lungs are tickled a' th' sere. 1604 T. Wright Pass. in Fairholt Costume (1860) 217 Sometimes I have seen Tarlton play the clowne, and use no other breeches than such sloppes or slivings as now many gentlemen weare. a 1643 W. Cartwright Commend. Verses Fletcher, Old-fashion'd wit, which walk'd from town to town In trunk-hose, which our fathers call'd the clown. 1822 Nares Gloss. s.v., The fool was indeed the inmate of every opulent house, but the rural jester, or clown, seems to have been peculiar to the country families. |
| b. 1727 J. Thurmond The Miser, (Characters), Harlequin's servant, a clown. 1728 R. & J. Weaver Perseus & Androm., Clown, the Squire's man. 1775 Lond. Mag. Dec., He [Harlequin]..converts part of the paling of an ale-house yard into a pillory, wherein having inclosed Pantaloon and the clown, etc. 1780 T. Davies Life Garrick I. 36 He was a most diverting clown in all the pantomimes of Mr. Rich. 1840 Dickens Old C. Shop xxxix, The clown who ventured on such familiarities with that military man in boots. 1855 Times 3 Apr., Never did Clown and Pantaloon belabour each other more heartily. |
4. attrib. and Comb., as clown part, etc. The possessive clown's forms part of certain plant-names: clown's all-heal, a name given by Gerarde to Stachys palustris (also, clown-heal, clown's wound-wort); clown's lungwort, (a) Verbascum Thapsus, (b) Lathræa squamaria; clown's mustard, Iberis amara; clown's spikenard, Inula Conyza; clown's treacle, Allium sativum.
| 1597 Gerarde Herbal ii. ccclxxiv. 851 Clounes Alheale, or the husbandman's Woundwoort, hath long slender stalks. a 1678 Marvell Poems, Damon the Mower 275 With shepherd's-purse and clowns-all-heal The blood I stanch and wound I seal. 1861 Miss Pratt Flower, Pl. I. 95 Iberis amara..sometimes called Clown's Mustard. 1783 Ainsworth Lat. Dict. (Morell) ii, Bacchar, a sweet herb, called by some our lady's gloves, by others, clown's spikenard. 1825 Hone Every Day Bk. I. 877 Clown's-woundwort, wake-robin, and..other simples. |
▪ II. clown, v.
(klaʊn)
[f. the n.]
1. intr. To perform as a (stage-)clown. to clown it: a. (a) to play the clown on the stage; (b) to affect the rusic (quot. 1599).
| 1599 B. Jonson Ev. Man out of Hum. v. ii, Sav. What, and shall we see him clown it?.. Beshrew me, he clowns it properly indeed. Fast. But does he not affect the clown most naturally, mistress? 1600 Rowlands [see clown n. 3]. 1707 E. Ward Hud. Rediv. (1715) i. xvii, As Andrew clowns it to the Doctor. 1861 Mayhew Lond. Labour III. 90, I had to clown to the rope. |
b. trans. To play the clown in (a part); to render comic or farcical; to portray like a clown.
| 1891 Harper's Mag. Sept. 500/2 A Benedick who makes faces and ‘clowns’ the part..leaves a distinct and horrible stain on the memory. 1930 Spectator 18 Jan. 83 Mr. Marshall was too intent on making his ‘asides’, and there were frequent episodes in which he definitely clowned the situation. 1957 E. Hyams Into Dream 43 Mr. Cromer clowned comic astonishment. 1963 W. Soyinka Lion & Jewel 14 He does realistic miming... Lakunle clowning the driving motions, obviously enjoying this fully. |
† 2. trans. ? To treat as a country clown, i.e. rudely or roughly. Obs.
| 1579 J. Jones Preserv. Bodie & Soule i. xxvi. 50 Without..dandling or dulling, cockering or clowning. |