Clowne

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. An archaic term for an uncouth country person, a peasant regarded as crude and lacking refinement
2. A rough, unmannered countryman, used in older English to describe someone thought of as boorish and ignorant
3. An old word for a plain, coarse rustic whose awkward manners made him the butt of polite society's scorn

Etymology: The modern "clown" is a later, refined form of "clowne," a word that once meant a rustic boor: a man of coarse manners, a peasant, a lout. Its earlier spellings "clowne" and "cloyne" show the same sense of a clumsy country fellow, and only over time did the word narrow toward the comic performer we know today. The likeliest origin is North Germanic, with close relatives in Icelandic "klunni" and Swedish "kluns," both meaning a clumsy fellow or klutz. These trace back to Middle Low German "klunz" and "klunt," which described a lump or thick, heavy mass. The image is of someone as shapeless and ungainly as a clod of earth. A Dutch word "kloen," meaning an uncouth lout, points the same way, suggesting the term may also have entered English directly from Low German. A tempting link to Latin "colonus," meaning farmer or colonist, has been considered, and it is unlikely to be the true source. Still, the resemblance may have shaped how English speakers heard the word, since it fits neatly with the idea of a rustic countryman.