See also: Crayon and crayón

English edit

 
Wax crayons.

Etymology edit

Borrowed from French crayon (pencil), from craie (chalk) + -on ((diminutive)), from Latin creta (chalk, clay), from crētus.

Pronunciation edit

  • enPR: krāʹŏn
    • (UK) IPA(key): /ˈkɹeɪ.ɒn/, /ˈkɹeɪ.ɒ̃/, /ˈkɹeɪ.ən/
      • (file)
    • (US) IPA(key): /ˈkɹeɪ.ɑn/; also /ˈkɹeɪ.ɔn/ (the most common pronunciations, used by 83% of Americans)[1]
      • (file)
      • (file)
  • (US, uncommon, especially Northeastern US, Midwestern US) IPA(key): /ˈkɹæn/, [ˈkɹeən][1]
  • (US, rare, especially Philadelphia, New Jersey, sometimes Southern US) IPA(key): /ˈkɹaʊn/, [ˈkɹɛɔn], [ˈkɹæɔn][1]
  • Rhymes: -eɪɒn, -eɪən, -æn, -aʊn

Noun edit

crayon (plural crayons)

  1. A stick of colored chalk or wax used for drawing.
    Hyponym: Conté
  2. A colored pencil, a colouring pencil
    Synonyms: pencil crayon (Canada), colouring pencil (UK)
    • 1695, C[harles] A[lphonse] du Fresnoy, translated by John Dryden, De Arte Graphica. The Art of Painting, [], London: [] J[ohn] Heptinstall for W. Rogers, [], →OCLC:
      Let no day pass over you [] without giving some strokes of the pencil or the crayon.
  3. (dated) A crayon drawing, or a drawing with colored lines.
    • 1885, Littell's Living Age, volume 167, page 187:
      But on the wall hung two fine crayons, representing Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette — pictures which she recognized as having hung in the corridor of the Tuileries — and in front of them were burning two candles on a species of rude altar.
  4. (dated) A pencil of carbon used in producing electric light.

Derived terms edit

Related terms edit

Translations edit

Verb edit

crayon (third-person singular simple present crayons, present participle crayoning or crayonning, simple past and past participle crayoned or crayonned)

  1. (transitive, intransitive) To draw with a crayon.

References edit

  • crayon”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

Further reading edit

Anagrams edit

French edit

Etymology edit

From craie (chalk) +‎ -on (diminutive), from Latin crēta (chalk, clay), from crētus.

Pronunciation edit

Noun edit

crayon m (plural crayons)

  1. pencil
  2. (colloquial) pen
  3. (vulgar, slang) cock, dick, prick

Descendants edit

Further reading edit