renown

Etymology

From Old French renon, from re- + non (“name”)

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɹɪˈnaʊn/
• Rhymes: -aʊn

Noun

renown (uncountable)

1. Fame; celebrity; wide recognition.
   • 1611, Bible (King James Version), Numbers 16:2:

     And they rose up before Moses, with certain of the children of Israel, two hundred and fifty princes of the assembly, famous in the congregation, men of renown: […]

   • 1700, [John] Dryden, “Palamon and Arcite: Or, The Knight’s Tale. In Three Books.”, in Fables Ancient and Modern; Translated into Verse, from Homer, Ovid, Boccace, & Chaucer: With Original Poems, London: Printed for Jacob Tonson, within Gray's Inn Gate next Gray's Inn Lane, OCLC 228732415, book I, page 3:

     […] Nor envy we / Thy great Renown, nor grudge thy Victory; / 'Tis thine, O King, th' Afflicted to redreſs, / And Fame has fill'd the World with thy Succeſs; […]

   • 1922, James Joyce, Ulysses Episode 12, The Cyclops

     There sleep the mighty dead as in life they slept, warriors and princes of high renown.

   • 1985, Lawrence Durrell, Quinx, New York: Viking, Chapter Three, p. 63,

     […] one day local fame would become world renown […]

2. (obsolete) Reports of nobleness or exploits; praise.
   • c. 1611, William Shakespeare, The Tempest, Act V, Scene 1,

     […] She

     Is daughter to this famous Duke of Milan,

     Of whom so often I have heard renown,

     But never saw before;