entry
cane
/keɪn/Long slender reed; walking stick; strike with one
From Greek canna (reed).
from Greek kanna , perhaps
from Latin canna "reed, cane,"
from Old French cane "reed, cane, spear" (13c., Modern French canne )
from Old French cane "reed, cane, spear" (13c., Modern French canne )
Word Ancestry
from Greek kanna , perhaps
from Latin canna "reed, cane,"
from Old French cane "reed, cane, spear" (13c., Modern French canne )
from Old French cane "reed, cane, spear" (13c., Modern French canne )
A humble reed somehow ended up giving English both a walking stick and a gun. The path runs from Greek kánna to Latin canna to Old French cane, where the idea was still something thin, straight, and plant-like — the sort of shape you could imagine for a spear shaft, a ruler, or a tube. Then the word wandered into Italian cannone, a “big tube,” and suddenly English had cannon, while Spanish gave us canyon, literally a kind of giant channel cut by water. Even canon belongs to the same family tree, though it took a more abstract route through the idea of a straight rule or measuring line. And in modern slang, to cane something is to hammer it hard or drive it fast — not a bad fate for a word that began life as a reed swaying by the riverbank.
The Story
A humble reed somehow ended up giving English both a walking stick and a gun. The path runs from Greek kánna to Latin canna to Old French cane, where the idea was still something thin, straight, and plant-like — the sort of shape you could imagine for a spear shaft, a ruler, or a tube. Then the word wandered into Italian cannone, a “big tube,” and suddenly English had cannon, while Spanish gave us canyon, literally a kind of giant channel cut by water. Even canon belongs to the same family tree, though it took a more abstract route through the idea of a straight rule or measuring line. And in modern slang, to cane something is to hammer it hard or drive it fast — not a bad fate for a word that began life as a reed swaying by the riverbank.
Modern Usage
To do something very aggressively, recklessly, or at high speed
Popularized by: internet slang and driving/motorcycling communities, especially through Urban Dictionary usage
Notable References
- to cane it
- caned the hairpin
Kin & Kindred
From 'canna'·reed, cane, tube
Derived Terms
English words from this root
Sources
Free Dictionary
Urban Dictionary