Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Derogatory An old woman considered to be ugly; a hag.
  • noun A woman who is venerated for experience, judgment, and wisdom.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A feeble and withered old woman: used depreciatively, and sometimes applied, with increased contempt, to a man.
  • noun An old ewe.

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

  • noun obsolete An old ewe.
  • noun An old woman; -- usually in contempt.
  • noun rare An old man; especially, a man who talks and acts like an old woman.

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

  • noun obsolete An old woman.
  • noun An archetypal figure, a Wise Woman.
  • noun An ugly, evil-looking, or frightening old woman; a hag.
  • noun obsolete An old ewe.
  • noun obsolete An old man, especially one who talks and acts like an old woman.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun an ugly evil-looking old woman

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, from Old North French carogne, carrion, cantankerous woman, from Vulgar Latin *carōnia, carrion, from Latin carō, carn-, flesh; see sker- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

OD. kronie, karonie, an old sheep, Old French carogne, French charogne, carrion. See carrion and crony.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word crone.

Examples

  • Kathy found Web sites that claim the title crone hasn't always been derogatory; in pre-Christian times, old women were particularly important members of the community.

    ABC News: ABCNews 2010

  • Mr Green said it was a cross between Huck Finn and Twilight, at which point your humble correspondent Lost the Plot and cackled like a crone from the back row of the Storey Hall.

    Reading Matters lili 2009

  • The crone is the old woman of great power whose life wisdom comes from both her great age and the many things she has lived through.

    October « 2009 « bindu wiles 2009

  • The crone is the old woman of great power whose life wisdom comes from both her great age and the many things she has lived through.

    The Crone and the Cauldron « bindu wiles 2009

  • That the crone is Polish must be constructed by the reader as a kind of logical inference: the Polish keep kosher, the crone keeps kosher, therefore the crone is Polish—that is, Orthodox.

    Archive 2009-07-01 2009

  • That the crone is Polish must be constructed by the reader as a kind of logical inference: the Polish keep kosher, the crone keeps kosher, therefore the crone is Polish—that is, Orthodox.

    Ideology as cultural marker 2009

  • It's pronounced just like the word crone, being named for the French town Crosne.

    languagehat.com: PRONUNCIATION QUIZ. 2004

  • According to Merriam-Webster's Dictionary the word crone dates back to the fourteenth century and is a Middle English term of abuse.

    ABC News: ABCNews 2010

  • Having an understandably violent reaction to the word crone she looked it up in the dictionary.

    ABC News: ABCNews 2010

  • The crone is the old woman of great power whose life wisdom comes from both her great age and the many things she has lived through.

    The Crone and the Cauldron | Bindu Wiles 2009

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • One aspect of the triple goddess in Wicca

    See also maiden and mother

    February 17, 2008

  • Wisewoman, post-menopause, a term of honor

    February 17, 2008

  • This is one of the old gods in Game Of Thrones.

    July 31, 2013