prawn

First attested early 1400s as various Middle English forms prayne, prane, praune, and prawne, which present no clear cognates in languages other than English. The forms suggest a hypothetical Old English form containing *æg, evolving into Middle English *ay, but it is unclear if the word is of Germanic origin or loaned from a substrate.

• IPA^(key): /pɹɔːn/

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔːn

prawn (countable and uncountable, plural prawn or prawns)

1. A shrimp of the suborder Dendrobranchiata.
2. (Commonwealth of Nations) A large shrimp
3. (slang) A woman with a very toned body, but an unattractive face.

   She's a prawn!

4. (Australia) A fool, an idiot.
   • 1999 August 2, Les Brown, “This old "almah" controversy”, in alt.religion.christian, Usenet‎:

     This is utter dribble. I've not read much worse than this in a long time - and he admits he doesn't know - "or so I am told". Get real, you prawn.

   • 2001 February 1, Ned Latham, “Lovesick Puppy Poetry - Volume 1”, in aus.culture.true-blue, Usenet‎:

     He didn't say he was accused of that, prawn.

• (woman): butterface, tip drill

• come the raw prawn
• king prawn

prawn (third-person singular simple present prawns, present participle prawning, simple past and past participle prawned)

1. (intransitive) To fish for prawns.

prawn (plural prawns)

1. Alternative form of porn

• Oxford English Dictionary, 1884–1928, and First Supplement, 1933.
• Århammar, Nils (1986): Aspects of Language: Geolinguistics