thorn
14
9.9
- noun
- /θɔrn/
- Archaic
:
letra thorn
- Card catalog entry reads: "Thorn: The Devil's Rune."
Examples
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The letter thorn was used in Old English texts to represent the 'th' sound.
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For the letters "thorn" and "eth," he often uses a simple "d" in the beginning and middle of words.
Academic text (1996) -
Among the ancient druids, Thorn represented a demon that spread sickness, destroyed crops, and brought death to hundreds of thousands of people.
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According to a Celtic legend, one child from each tribe was chosen to be inflicted with a curse of Thorn.
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In some early Germanic alphabets, the thorn character is derived from the runic script.
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Linguists study thorn as part of the evolution of the English language.
Idioms
Compounds
A spiny shrub from Madagascar grown as a houseplant with small flowers and bright red petals
- Specialized
A small tree or bush from eastern North America with long sharp thorns, white flowers, and red berries
A tall poisonous plant with bad-smelling leaves, large trumpet-shaped flowers, and spiky fruit
- South African
A South African bush with sharp forked branches and fruit like small plums often planted as a fence
A thorny shrub or small tree with yellow flowers often grown in warm, dry places
A small thorny tree or shrub from the southern United States with leaves like parsley
Surface Forms
Etymology
Thorn was also the name of an old letter, written þ, used in Old English. The letter was named after the plant 'thorn', and later its sound was written with 'th', as in 'that'.