bren

See also: Bren, BrEn, brén, and Břeň

English

Etymology

From Middle English brennen, from Old English bærnan, from Proto-Germanic *brannijaną (“to set on fire”). Cognate with German brennen, Swedish bränna. Doublet of burn; see there for more.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /bɹɛn/
• Rhymes: -ɛn

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Verb

bren (third-person singular simple present brens, present participle brenning, simple past brenned, past participle brenned or brent)

1. (obsolete, transitive) To burn (to set ablaze).
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book III, Canto III”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:

     And the greene grasse that groweth they shall bren,
     That even the wilde beast shall dy in starved den

Related terms

• brending

Anagrams

• Bern, NBER, Nebr.

Albanian

Alternative forms

• breh

Etymology

Related to bredh (“fir”).

Noun

bren m

1. silver fir (Abies alba)

Australian Kriol

Etymology

From English friend.

Noun

bren

1. friend

Catalan

Etymology

From Old Catalan breny, from Gaulish *brennos (“rotten”), from Proto-Celtic *bragnos (“foul, rotten”). Cognate with English bran.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): (Central) [ˈbɾɛn]
• IPA^(key): (Balearic) [ˈbɾən]
• IPA^(key): (Valencia) [ˈbɾen]

Noun

bren m (plural brens)

1. bran

   Synonym: segó

Further reading

• “bren”, in Diccionari de la llengua catalana [Dictionary of the Catalan Language] (in Catalan), second edition, Institute of Catalan Studies [Catalan: Institut d'Estudis Catalans], April 2007
• “bren”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2025
• “bren” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.

Middle English

Etymology 1

Noun

bren

1. alternative form of bran
   • 14th c. Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales. The Reeve's Tale: 197-9

     The moore queynte crekes that they make,
     The moore wol I stele whan I take.
     In stide of flour yet wol I yeve hem bren.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

Etymology 2

Verb

bren

1. alternative form of brennen

Old French

Alternative forms

• bran, brent, brin

Etymology

Celtic loanword, from Gaulish *brennos (“rotten”), from Proto-Celtic *bragnos (“foul, rotten”).

Noun

bren oblique singular, m (nominative singular brens)

1. bran

Descendants

• ⇒ French: berner
• → Middle English: bran, branne, bren
  • English: bran
  • Yola: bran
• → Old Galician-Portuguese: bren

References

• “bren”, in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th edition, Boston, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016, →ISBN.

Welsh

Noun

bren

1. soft mutation of pren

Mutation

Mutated forms of pren

radical	soft	nasal	aspirate
pren	bren	mhren	phren

Note: Certain mutated forms of some words can never occur in standard Welsh.
All possible mutated forms are displayed for convenience.