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tun

Pronunciation: /tʌn/

The English word “tun” has 13 meanings listed here.

noun

  1. A large cask; an oblong vessel bulging in the middle, like a pipe or puncheon, and girt with hoops; a wine cask. (See a diagram comparing cask sizes.)
  2. A fermenting vat.
  3. A traditional unit of liquid measure (from the volume of such a cask) equal to 252 wine gallons or 2 pipes.
  4. Synonym of long ton: a unit of mass equal to 2240 pounds, 20 hundredweights of 112 pounds avoirdupois each.
  5. Synonym of ton: any extremely or excessively large amount.
  6. Synonym of drunkard: a person who drinks excessively.
  7. Any shell belonging to Tonna and allied genera.
  8. The cryptobiotic state of a tardigrade, when its metabolism is temporarily suspended.
  9. A small silver cup holding half a pint, sometimes having a whistle in the handle that could not be blown until the cup was empty.
  10. a chimney.
  11. A part of the ancient Maya Long Count Calendar system which corresponds to 18 winal cycles or 360 days.
  12. A respectful term of address to royalties and certain award recipients

verb

  1. To put into tuns, or casks.

Etymology

From Middle English tunne, tonne (“cask, barrel”), from Old English tunne (“tun, cask, barrel”), from Proto-Germanic *tunnǭ, *tunnō (“tun, barrel, cask”), from Latin tunna, probably of Gaulish origin. Cognate with North Frisian tenn (“tun, barrel, cask”), Dutch ton (“tun, barrel, cask”), German Tonne (“tun, barrel, drum”), Danish tønde (“barrel”), Swedish tunna (“barrel, cask, tun”), Icelandic…

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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.