ban.
To prohibit; to interdict; to proscribe; to forbid or block from participation.
Meaning & usage
To prohibit; to interdict; to proscribe; to forbid or block from participation.
Bare feet are banned in this establishment.
To summon; to call out.
To anathematize; to pronounce an ecclesiastical curse upon; to place under a ban.
To curse; to execrate.
To curse; to utter curses or maledictions.
Where this word comes from
Inherited from Middle English bannen (“to summon; to banish; to curse”), partly from Old English bannan (“to summon, command, proclaim, call out”), from Proto-West Germanic *bannan; and partly from Old Norse banna (“to prohibit; to curse”), both from Proto-Germanic *bannaną (“to proclaim, to order; to summon; to ban; to curse, forbid”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰh₂-new-ti ~ bʰh₂-n̥w-énti, innovative nasal-infixed zero-grade athematic present of *bʰeh₂- (“to say”). Cognate with Dutch bannen (“to ban, exile, discard”), German bannen (“to exile, to exorcise, captivate, excommunicate”), Swedish banna (“to ban, scold”), Vedic Sanskrit भन॑ति (bhánati), Armenian բան (ban) and perhaps Albanian banoj (“to reside, dwell”). See also banal, abandon.
A prohibition.
A public proclamation or edict; also, a summons by public proclamation, and in early use especially a summons to arms.
The gathering of the (French) king’s vassals for war; the whole body of vassals assembled this way, or liable to be summoned; originally the same as arriere-ban, but distinct since the 16th century, following French usage—see arriere-ban.
A curse or anathema.
A pecuniary mulct or penalty laid upon a delinquent for offending against a ban, such as a mulct paid to a bishop by one guilty of sacrilege or other crimes.
Where this word comes from
Inherited from Middle English bannen (“to summon; to banish; to curse”), partly from Old English bannan (“to summon, command, proclaim, call out”), from Proto-West Germanic *bannan; and partly from Old Norse banna (“to prohibit; to curse”), both from Proto-Germanic *bannaną (“to proclaim, to order; to summon; to ban; to curse, forbid”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰh₂-new-ti ~ bʰh₂-n̥w-énti, innovative nasal-infixed zero-grade athematic present of *bʰeh₂- (“to say”). Cognate with Dutch bannen (“to ban, exile, discard”), German bannen (“to exile, to exorcise, captivate, excommunicate”), Swedish banna (“to ban, scold”), Vedic Sanskrit भन॑ति (bhánati), Armenian բան (ban) and perhaps Albanian banoj (“to reside, dwell”). See also banal, abandon.
A subdivision of currency, equal to one hundredth of a Romanian leu.
A subdivision of currency, equal to one hundredth of a Moldovan leu.
Where this word comes from
Borrowed from Romanian ban of uncertain origin, perhaps from Serbo-Croatian bân.
A unit measuring information or entropy based on base-ten logarithms, rather than the base-two logarithms that define the bit.
Where this word comes from
From Banburismus; coined by Alan Turing.
A title used in several states in central and south-eastern Europe between the 7th century and the 20th century.
Where this word comes from
From South Slavic (compare Serbo-Croatian bȃn), from Proto-Slavic *banъ; see there for more.
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.