bourn
pronunciation
How to pronounce bourn in British English:
UK [bɜ:n]
How to pronounce bourn in American English:
US [bɜn]
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- Noun:
- an archaic term for a boundary
- an archaic term for a goal or destination
Word Origin
- bourn (n.1)
- also bourne, "small stream," especially of the winter torrents of the chalk downs, Old English brunna, burna "brook, stream," from Proto-Germanic *brunnoz "spring, fountain" (cognates: Old High German brunno, Old Norse brunnr, Old Frisian burna, German Brunnen "fountain," Gothis brunna "well"), ultimately from PIE root *bhreue- "to boil, bubble, effervesce, burn" (see brew (v.)).
- bourn (n.2)
- "destination," 1520s, from French borne, apparently a variant of bodne (see bound (n.)). Used by Shakespeare in Hamlet's soliloquy (1602), from which it entered into English poetic speech. He meant it probably in the correct sense of "boundary," but it has been taken to mean "goal" (Wordsworth, Matthew Arnold) or sometimes "realm" (Keats).The dread of something after death, The vndiscouered Countrey; from whose Borne No Traueller returnes. ["Hamlet" III.i.79]
Example
- 1. Love deeply in such a sad bourn .
- 2. Together they established the bourn hall clinic in cambridge , the world 's first center for ivf therapy .
- 3. It is the truest life scene and the best life civilization where life bourn is rested .
- 4. So he , both in the chinese medicine and literature circles , delivers the feeling of universe and earth 's change and also seeks for the bourn of philosophical thought and poetics .
- 5. So the zen of buddhist culture and the martial arts complement each other to achieve the highest bourn of mutual penetration .