different between cairn vs bairn

English

Etymology

From Scots cairn, from Scottish Gaelic carn (“heap of stones”), from Old Irish carn, from Proto-Celtic *karnos, from Proto-Indo-European *?erh?- (“horn”).

Compare Welsh carn, Cornish carn. Doublet of carn and horn.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /k??n/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /k???n/

Noun

cairn (plural cairns)

1. A rounded or conical heap of stones erected by early inhabitants of the British Isles, apparently as a sepulchral monument.
   • 1826, Thomas Campbell, Glenara, in The Poetical Works of Thomas Campbell, page 105:

     "Now here let us place the gray stone of her cairn: / Why speak ye no word!"—said Glenara the stern.

2. A pile of stones heaped up as a landmark, to guide travelers on land or at sea, or to arrest attention, as in surveying, or in leaving traces of an exploring party, etc.
3. A cairn terrier.

Synonyms

• burial mound

Derived terms

• cairned (adjective)
• cairn terrier

Translations

References

• cairn in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• “cairn”, in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th edition, Boston, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016, ?ISBN

Anagrams

• CARIN, Crain, Nicar., racin'

French

Noun

cairn m (plural cairns)

1. cairn

Irish

Pronunciation

• (Munster, Connacht) IPA^(key): /k????n??/
• (Ulster) IPA^(key): /ka???n??/

Noun

cairn

1. inflection of carn:
   1. vocative/genitive singular
   2. nominative/dative plural

Mutation

English

Etymology

Orthographic borrowing from Scots bairn, from Middle English bern, barn, from Old English bearn, from Proto-Germanic *barn?. Doublet of barn. Compare West Frisian bern.

Pronunciation

• (Scotland) IPA^(key): /bern/, /b?rn/
• (Northumberland, North Durham, rhotic) IPA^(key): /?b???n/
• (UK, rhotic) IPA^(key): /?b???n/
• (UK, non-rhotic) IPA^(key): /?b??n/, /?b??n/
• (US, Canada, Ireland, West Country) IPA^(key): /?b??n/

In some areas (e.g. Bradford), pronounced as IPA^(key): /?ba?n/. See Etymology 2 under barn.(See page 216 in Joseph Wright's A Grammar of the Dialect of Windhill).

Noun

bairn (plural bairns)

1. (Scotland, and parts of Northern England) A child or baby.

Synonyms

• See also Thesaurus:child.

Translations

Derived terms

• bairnie/bairny
• bairnish
• bairnless
• bairnlike
• shy bairns get nowt, shy bairns get noot
• stepbairn

References

• Frank Graham (1987) The New Geordie Dictionary, ?ISBN
• Newcastle 1970s, Scott Dobson and Dick Irwin, [1]
• Northumberland Words, English Dialect Society, R. Oliver Heslop, 1893–4
• Todd's Geordie Words and Phrases, George Todd, Newcastle, 1977[2]
• A Dictionary of North East Dialect, Bill Griffiths, 2005, Northumbria University Press, ?ISBN
• Douglas Harper (2001–2021) , “bairn”, in Online Etymology Dictionary
• bairn in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

References

• “bairn”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–present.

Anagrams

• Barin, Brain, Brian, Rabin, abrin, brain, brian

Scots

Etymology

From Middle English barn, bern, from Old English bearn (“child, son, descendant, offspring, issue, progeny”) and Old Norse barn (“child”), both from Proto-Germanic *barn? (“child”), from Proto-Indo-European *b?er- (“to bear, bring forth”). Cognate with West Frisian bern (“child”), North Frisian baern, born (“child”), Middle High German barn (“child, son, daughter”), Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Faroese and Icelandic barn (“child”), Albanian barrë (“pregnancy, child”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /bern/, /b?rn/

Noun

bairn (plural bairns)

1. child

Derived terms

• bairnheid
• bairnie
• grandbairn
• stap-bairn

Descendants

• ? English: bairn

Verb

bairn (third-person singular present bairns, present participle bairnin, past bairnt, past participle bairnt)

1. to make pregnant

References

• “bairn” in the Dictionary of the Scots Language, Edinburgh: Scottish Language Dictionaries.