Boon

Pronunciation

• IPA: /buːn/Rhymes: -uːn

From Middle English boon ("prayer"), from Old Norse bόn ("prayer, petition"), from Proto-Germanic *bōniz ("supplication"), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂ni-, *bʰeh₂- ("to say"). Influenced by boon ("good, favorable", adj.). Cognate with Swedish bön ("prayer, petition, request"), Danish bøn ("prayer"), Old English bēn ("prayer, request, favor, compulsory service"). More at ben.

Full definition of boon

Noun

1. (obsolete) A prayer; petition.
• :For which to God he made so many an idle boon...
2. (archaic) That which is asked or granted as a benefit or favor; a gift; a favour; benefaction; a grant; a present.
• :Every good gift and every perfect boon is from above ...
• 1872, James De Mille, The Cryptogram:I gave you life. Can you not return the boon by giving me death, my lord?
3. A good; a blessing or benefit; a great privilege; a thing to be thankful for.
• 2013, Catherine Clabby, Focus on Everything, Not long ago, it was difficult to produce photographs of tiny creatures with every part in focus....A photo processing technique called focus stacking has changed that. Developed as a tool to electronically combine the sharpest bits of multiple digital images, focus stacking is a boon to biologists seeking full focus on a micron scale.
4. Finding the dry cave was a boon to the weary travellers.   Anaesthetics are a great boon to modern surgery.
5. (UK dialectal) An unpaid service due by a tenant to his lord.

Synonyms

• blessing
• benefit

Antonyms

• bane

From Middle English boon, bone, from Old Northern French boon, Old French bon ("good"), from Latin bonus ("good"), from Old Latin duonus, dvenos, from Proto-Indo-European *dū- ("to respect").

Adjective

1. (obsolete) good; prosperous; as, "boon voyage"
2. kind; bountiful; benign
• MiltonWhich ... Nature boon
  Poured forth profuse on hill, and dale, and plain.
3. gay; merry; jovial; convivial
• Arbuthnota boon companion, loving his bottle
• Joyce Ulysses Episode 16--No, Mr Bloom repeated again, I wouldn't personally repose much trust in that boon companion of yours who contributes the humorous element, if I were in your shoes.

From Gaelic and Irish via Scots.

Noun

1. The woody portion of flax, separated from the fiber as refuse matter by retting, braking, and scutching.

Anagrams

• noob
• obon