thane
/θeɪn/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.88 in modern English
8
Scrabble Score
5
Letters
1
Syllables
5
Unique Chars
Meaning
name
A large city and district of Maharashtra, India, part of the Mumbai Metropolitan Region.
Example Sentences
- "Sonnes, Kinsmen, Thanes, / And you whose places are the nearest, know, / We will establish our Estate vpon / Our eldest, Malcolme, whom we name hereafter, / The Prince of Cumberland: […]"
- "The Anglo-Saxon thanes were in all respects the predecessors of the Norman barons. The title of thane seems to have supplanted that of gesith, which appears only in the earner Anglo-Saxon laws, a denomination that may originally have designated the attendants or companions of the king, and whose wergild being triple that of the simple freeman, were, therefore, denominated not only gesithcund men, but six-hynde men."
- "The little island of Iona became the refuge of the sons and some thanes of Athelfrith, banished by Edwin."
- "Never need you fear for a single thane of your sept or nation, young warriors or old."
- "2000, Wulfstan, Robert Boenig (editor and translator), Sermo Lupi ad Anglos, Anglo-Saxon Spirituality: Selected Writings, page 144, Although some serfs escape from their lord and turn away from Christendom to the Vikings and after this it happens that the clash of swords becomes common to thane and serf, if the serf utterly kills the thane, he lies unpaid by all of the serf's kin."
Etymology
From Middle English theyn, thein, þein, from Old English þæġn, þeġen, þeġn, from Proto-West Germanic *þegn (“man, warrior”), from Proto-Germanic *þegnaz (“man, warrior”), from Proto-Indo-European *teḱ- (“to give birth”); akin to Dutch degen, German Degen, Old Norse þegn and Ancient Greek τέκνον (téknon, “child”).
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: theyn, þæġn, *þegn, *þegnaz, *teḱ-
Inflected Forms
Derived Forms
Phrases
gesith < ġesīþ
Frequently Paired Words
baron
gesith < ġesīþ