donjon

A variant of dungeon remodelled on its etymon, Old French donjon.

• IPA^(key): /ˈdʌn.d͡ʒən/

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donjon (plural donjons)

1. The fortified tower and main residence of a motte or early castle; a keep.
   • 1819 December 20 (indicated as 1820), Walter Scott, chapter VII, in Ivanhoe; a Romance. […], volume II, Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co. […], →OCLC, page 106:

     It was a fortress of no great size, consisting of a donjon, or large and high square tower, surrounded by buildings of inferior height, which were encircled by an inner court-yard.

   • 2007, Michael Chabon, Gentlemen of the Road, Sceptre, published 2008, page 132:

     […] the prison fortress called Qomr, a mound of yellowish brick rising up from the left back of the turbid river, in whose donjon by long tradition the warlord was obliged to lay his head.

• dungeon

From French donjon.

• IPA^(key): /dɔnˈʒɔn/, [dɔ̃ˈʒɔ̃], [dɔnˈʒɔn]

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• Hyphenation: don‧jon
• Rhymes: -ɔn

donjon m (plural donjons, diminutive donjonnetje n)

1. donjon, keep

• slottoren

From Old French donjon, from Vulgar Latin *dominiōnem.

• IPA^(key): /dɔ̃.ʒɔ̃/

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donjon m (plural donjons)

1. donjon, keep

• → Dutch: donjon
• → Italian: dongione
• → Romanian: donjon

• “donjon”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

donjon

1. alternative form of dongeoun

Inherited from Vulgar Latin *dominiōnem. Attested in Old French from ca. 1160.^[1] Compare Old Occitan domnhon.

Sense 2 probably a semantic loan from Old English dung (“prison, dungeon”).

• (classical) IPA^(key): /dunˈd͡ʒun/
• (late) IPA^(key): /dunˈʒun/

donjon oblique singular, m (oblique plural donjons, nominative singular donjons, nominative plural donjon)

1. keep, donjon
   • 12^th Century, Béroul, Tristan et Iseut:

     Li chiens gardoit par le donjon / Qar mis estoit a grant freor / Quant il ne voiet son seignor.

     The dog looked through the keep, for he felt a great terror when he couldn't see his master.

2. (Anglo-Norman)^[2] keep used as a prison; dungeon

• French: donjon (see there for further descendants)
• Picard: donjôn (Athois)
• → Middle English: dongeoun
  • English: dungeon, donjon
  • Scots: dungeon
• → Medieval Latin: dominiōnus

• donjun on the Anglo-Norman On-Line Hub
• “donjon”, in DEAF: Dictionnaire Étymologique de l'Ancien Français, Heidelberg: Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1968-.

Borrowed from French donjon.

donjon n (plural donjoane)

1. donjon