colon

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈkəʊ.lən/, /ˈkəʊ.lɒn/
• (US) enPR: kō'lən, IPA^(key): /ˈkoʊ.lən/, /ˈkɔ.lən/, [ˈkʰɔ.ɫn̩]

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -əʊlən

From Latin cōlon (“a member of a verse of poem”), from Ancient Greek κῶλον (kôlon, “a member, limb, clause, part of a verse”).

colon (plural colons or cola)

1. The punctuation mark ⟨:⟩.
   • 2005, William Strunk Jr., E.B. White, The Elements of Style, Penguin Press, page 15:

     A colon tells the reader that what follows is closely related to the preceding clause.

2. (rare) The triangular colon (especially in context of not being able to type the actual triangular colon).
3. (rhetoric) A rhetorical figure consisting of a clause which is grammatically, but not logically, complete.
4. (palaeography) A clause or group of clauses written as a line, or taken as a standard of measure in ancient manuscripts or texts.

• (punctuation mark): colon-point (obsolete)

• Wikipedia article on colons (in punctuation)

Punctuation

From Latin cŏlon (“large intestine”), from Ancient Greek κόλον (kólon, “the large intestine, also food, meat, fodder”).

colon (plural colons or cola or coli)

2. (anatomy) Part of the large intestine; the final segment of the digestive system, after (distal to) the ileum and before (proximal to) the rectum. (Because the colon is the largest part of the large intestine (constituting most of it), it is often treated as synonymous therewith in broad or casual usage.)

• ascending colon
• transverse colon
• descending colon
• sigmoid colon

• (segment of digestive system): large intestine, large bowel

• Wikipedia article on the colon (in anatomy)
• bowel
• large intestine
• rectum

From French colon.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /kəˈlɒn/
• (US) IPA^(key): /kəˈloʊn/,^[1] /koʊ.loʊn/^[2]

colon (plural colons)

1. (obsolete) A husbandman.
2. A European colonial settler, especially in a French colony.
   • 1977, Alistair Horne, A Savage War of Peace, New York: Review Books, published 2006, page 28:

     The reaction of the European colons, a mixture of shock and fear, was to demand further draconian measures and to suspend any suggestion of new reforms.

• colone

• https://web.archive.org/web/20050326041700/http://humanities.byu.edu/rhetoric/Figures/C/colon.htm Part of a glossary of classical rhetorical terms.
• “colon”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “colon”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “colon”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

• Locon, locon, lonco

colon m (plural cólones)

1. (anatomy) colon (digestive system)

• IPA^(key): (Central) [kuˈlon]
• IPA^(key): (Balearic, Valencia) [koˈlon]

Borrowed from Latin colōnus.

colon m (plural colons, feminine colona)

1. colonist, settler
2. farmer during the Roman Empire

• colònia

Borrowed from Spanish colón.

colon m (plural colons)

1. (numismatics) colón (currency unit of Costa Rica, and formerly of El Salvador)

• “colon” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.

colon

1. accusative singular of colo

Learned borrowing from Latin colōnus.

• IPA^(key): /kɔ.lɔ̃/

colon m (plural colons)

1. colonist, colonizer, colonial settler
   • Laurent Lamoine, Le Pouvoir locale en Gaule romaine, 2009, 240.

     Sous les auspices du dictateur A. Cornelius Cossus, les Romains viennent de remporter une victoire sur leurs voisins Volsques, Latins et Herniques, associés aux colons romains en rébellion de Circéi et Vélitrae.

   • 1925, Nguyễn Ái Quốc, “V - Les civilisateurs”, in Le procès de la colonisation française; translated as “V — The Civilizers”, in French Colonization on Trial (Selected Works of Hồ Chí Minh), volume I, Paris: Foreign Languages Press, 2021, page 288:

     Qu'ils soient militaires ou colons, ils ne conçoivent pas ordinairement d'autres formes de relations avec l'indigène que celles dont ils usent avec leurs domestiques.

     Whether they are military men or colonial settlers, they normally visualize no other kind of relations with the natives than those they have with their servants.

2. camper (child in a colonie de vacances)
   • José Casatéjada, Via Compostela: Des Monts du Velay à la Costa da Morte, 2015, 243.

     Une fois encore, ils me ramènant à mon enfance, aux colonies de vacances. Aves les autres petits colons, mes frères et moi trottions sur les chemins de traverse pour aller jouer dans les près ou à la rivière.

3. sharecropper in the system of colonat partiaire
4. (vulgar, Canada) hillbilly, hick

• colonie
• coloniser

See côlon.

colon

1. Misspelling of côlon.

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

Abbreviation of colonel.[1]

• IPA^(key): /kɔ.lɔ̃/

1. (military slang) colonel

• mon colon (interjection)

colon (uncountable)

1. (anatomy) colon

Unadapted borrowing from Latin colon, from Ancient Greek κόλον (kólon).

• IPA^(key): /ˈkɔ.lon/
• Rhymes: -ɔlon
• Hyphenation: cò‧lon

colon m (invariable)

1. (anatomy) colon (part of the body)

• colectomia
• colite
• colon ascendente
• colon discendente
• colon sigmoideo
• colon trasverso
• colonscopia
• colostomia
• sindrome del colon irritabile

Unadapted borrowing from Latin cōlon, from Ancient Greek κῶλον (kôlon).

• IPA^(key): /ˈkɔ.lon/
• Rhymes: -ɔlon
• Hyphenation: cò‧lon

colon m (plural cola)

1. colon (punctuation mark)

Unadapted borrowing from Spanish colón.

• IPA^(key): /koˈlɔn/
• Rhymes: -ɔn
• Hyphenation: co‧lòn

colon m (plural colones)

1. Alternative form of colón

• clono, clonò

From Ancient Greek κόλον (kólon).

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈko.lon/, [ˈkɔɫ̪ɔn]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈko.lon/, [ˈkɔːlon]

colon n (genitive colī); second declension

1. (anatomy) The colon; large intestine
2. colic, a disease of the colon

Second-declension noun (neuter, Greek-type).

From Ancient Greek κῶλον (kôlon).

• cōlum
• cōlus

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈkoː.lon/, [ˈkoːɫ̪ɔn]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈko.lon/, [ˈkɔːlon]

cōlon n (genitive cōlī); second declension

1. a member or part of a verse of a poem

Second-declension noun (neuter, Greek-type).

• (member of a verse): membrum

• → English: colon

• “colon”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• colon in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• “colon”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers

Borrowed from French côlon.

colon m (plural coloni)

1. colon

• IPA^(key): /ˈkolon/ [ˈko.lõn]

• Audio (Colombia):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -olon
• Syllabification: co‧lon

From Latin cōlon, from Ancient Greek κῶλον (kôlon).

colon m (plural cólones)

1. (grammar) colon (punctuation mark)

From Latin cŏlon, from Ancient Greek κόλον (kólon).

colon m (plural cólones)

1. (anatomy) colon (part of the large intestine)

• colonoscopia, colonoscopía
• colonoscopio
• megacolon
• mesocolon

• “colon”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.7, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 2023 November 28