cran
English Edit
Etymology 1 Edit
Most likely from Goidelic; compare Scottish Gaelic crann (“lot, measure of herring, tree, etc.”).
Alternative forms Edit
Noun Edit
cran (plural crans or cran)
- (obsolete) A measure of herrings, either imprecise or sometimes legally specified. It has oftentimes been about 37½ imperial gallons, or ~750 herrings on average (up to 1200 or even ~2500).
- 1800 Dec, Sir Richard Phillips, The Monthly magazine[1], volume 10, number 66, page 486:
- Very flattering indeed has been the success of the fishermen; and many boats have come in loaded, averaging thirty or forty crans each (every cran estimated at 1,000 herrings), and disposed of their cargoes at nine shillings per cran; but the price has been since raised to fifteen shillings.
- 1938, Louis MacNeice, Bagpipe Music:
- His brother caught three hundred cran when the seas were lavish, / Threw the bleeders back in the sea and went upon the parish.
- 1960, Ewan MacColl, BBC radio ballad, Singing the Fishing:
- […] And fish the knolls on the North Sea Holes
And try your luck at the North Shields Gut
With a catch of a hundred cran.
- (obsolete, rare, by extension) A barrel made to hold such a measure.
- For more quotations using this term, see Citations:cran.
Etymology 2 Edit
(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)
Noun Edit
cran (plural crans)
- (music) An embellishment played on the lowest note of a chanter of a bagpipe, consisting of a series of grace notes produced by rapid sequential lifting of the fingers of the lower hand.
Etymology 3 Edit
Noun Edit
cran (plural crans)
- Alternative form of qiran
See also Edit
Anagrams Edit
French Edit
Etymology Edit
Deverbal of créner (“to kern”), from crenedes (“notched”), from Vulgar Latin *crinare, probably of Celtic/Gaulish origin, from Proto-Celtic *krini-, from Proto-Indo-European *krey- (“to divide, separate”).[1] Or, less likely, from Latin cernō (“to separate”), itself from the same root.[2]
Pronunciation Edit
Noun Edit
cran m (plural crans)
- notch
- (firearms) safety catch
- (belt) hole
- (hair) wave
- (colloquial) guts, bottle, courage
- Ce garçon a du cran, pour oser sauter en parachute.
- This boy has guts, jumping with the parachute.
- 1998, “Agrévolution”, in Ol Kainry (lyrics), Ce n’est que l’début, performed by Agression Verbale:
- Tu sais pourquoi on voit grand, depuis qu’on est grand, qu’on a du cran / C’est que la merde nous a pendu, on est adolescent / Cran d’arrêt en guise de porte bonheur
- (please add an English translation of this quotation)
Derived terms Edit
References Edit
- ^ “cranny”, in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th edition, Boston, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016, →ISBN.
- ^ Douglas Harper (2001–2023), “cranny”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.
Further reading Edit
- “cran”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.
Old English Edit
Etymology Edit
From Proto-West Germanic *kranō.
Pronunciation Edit
Noun Edit
cran m
- crane (bird)
- Se cran wæs standende on ānum sċancan.
- The crane was standing on one leg.
- Oft man ġehīerþ cranas lange ǣr hē hīe ġesiehþ.
- You often hear cranes long before you see them.
- Þā cranas wyrċaþ heora nest on ċiriċena belhūsum.
- The cranes make their nests in the bell towers of churches.
Declension Edit
Declension of cran (strong a-stem)
Descendants Edit
Romanian Edit
Noun Edit
cran n (plural cranuri)
- Obsolete form of craniu.
Declension Edit
Declension of cran
| singular | plural | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| indefinite articulation | definite articulation | indefinite articulation | definite articulation | |
| nominative/accusative | (un) cran | cranul | (niște) cranuri | cranurile |
| genitive/dative | (unui) cran | cranului | (unor) cranuri | cranurilor |
| vocative | cranule | cranurilor | ||