Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A kite of the genus Pernis or some related genus; a honey-buzzard.
  • To turn to profit; sell.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb obsolete To take profit of; to make profitable.
  • noun (Zoöl.) The honey buzzard.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun part of a spinning wheel, a conical spool onto which the thread is wound from the spindle
  • noun A honey buzzard; Pernis apivorus.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

19th century, after the taxonomical name Pernis (Cuvier 1816).

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Presumably from a verb pern, a variant of preen, from Middle English prene; pernyng is read by some editors in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (v. 611) and interpreted as the present participle of this verb, also reflected dialectally as pirn ("reel; bobbin") (Charles Moorman, The Works of the Gawain-Poet, 2009, p. 324) See also pirl.

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Examples

  • Ramoth and Mnementh from the dragon riders of pern series. retweeting about the party and the fact I won Angels Blood yesterday woot me.

    Countdown to Branded By Fire: 7 days to go! Nalini Singh 2009

  • Ai fot herz sed wuz pern…pronu…sed She-o-von… Iz dis rite?

    Do I KNOW you? - Lolcats 'n' Funny Pictures of Cats - I Can Has Cheezburger? 2008

  • These of course are science fiction or fantasy books dealing with the history of colonization of another planet called pern.

    2006 September 16 — Meandering Passage 2006

  • Besides they would cut the heck out of every book like what was done to Harry Potter, and lets face it, to do pern you need to do it all and well.

    Pern Movie! 2006

  • Then along comes Copperheart who have said they will make pern into a movie and that was back in 2006, so if anyone out there knows for sure if indeed there is to be a movie and when its likely to be out, please post here and lets us all know.

    Pern Movie! 2006

  • He is the Forrest Gump of pern..always managing to be in the right place at the right ttime to see all the political happenings on pern that would shed light to all newcomers to pern lore as to the socity that is pern…hmm…something to think about

    Pern Movie! 2006

  • I no longer remember every detail, lucid and logical though they were, but it involved pern-type firelizards miniature dragons, familiars, astral bodies and magic children.

    Conversation in a dream Torill 2005

  • I no longer remember every detail, lucid and logical though they were, but it involved pern-type firelizards miniature dragons, familiars, astral bodies and magic children.

    Archive 2005-06-01 Torill 2005

  • Before this ugly edifice, and between it and the wheel-track of the street, was a grass-plot, much overgrown with burdock, pig-weed, apple-pern, and such unsightly vegetation, which evidently found something congenial in the soil that had so early borne the black flower of civilised society, a prison.

    The Scarlet Letter 2002

  • Before this ugly edifice, and between it and the wheel-track of the street, was a grass-plot, much overgrown with burdock, pig-weed, apple-pern, and such unsightly vegetation, which evidently found something congenial in the soil that had so early borne the black flower of civilised society, a prison.

    I. The Scarlet Letter 1917

Comments

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  • "Come from the holy fire,

    Pern in a gyre,

    And be the singing masters of my soul"

    W.B. Yeats, Sailing to Byzantium

    So I guess "pern" means spin, but I'm not sure.

    June 23, 2009

  • For more about Sailing to Byzantium, see perne.

    In the meantime, check out this etymology: "Presumably from a verb pern, a variant of preen, from Middle English prene; pernyng is read by some editors in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (v. 611) and interpreted as the present participle of this verb, also reflected dialectally as pirn ("reel; bobbin") (Charles Moorman, The Works of the Gawain-Poet, 2009, p. 324) See also pirl."

    October 31, 2013