crayon

Borrowed from French crayon (“pencil”), from craie (“chalk”) +‎ -on (diminutive suffix), from Latin crēta (“chalk, clay”), perhaps from crētus.

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈkɹeɪ̯.ɒn/, [ˈkɹeɪ̯.ɒ̃]
• IPA^(key): (Received Pronunciation, less common in the US) /ˈkɹeɪ̯.ən/^[1][2][3]
• (Standard Southern British) IPA^(key): /ˈkɹɛj.ɔn/, /ˈkɹɛj.ən/

  • Audio (Southern England):

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• (US, without the cot–caught merger) IPA^(key): /ˈkɹeɪ̯.ɑn/, /ˈkɹeɪ̯.ɔn/^[3]

  • Audio (New York City):

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• IPA^(key): (US, cot–caught merger) /ˈkɹeɪ̯.ɑn/^[3]

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• (US, especially Northeastern US, Midwestern US) IPA^(key): /ˈkɹæn/, [ˈkɹɛə̯n ~ ˈkɹeə̯n]^[3]

  • Audio (US):

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• (US, less common, chiefly Philadelphia, New Jersey, sometimes Southern US, sometimes Midwestern US, sometimes Western US) IPA^(key): /ˈkɹaʊ̯n/, [ˈkɹɛɔ̯n], [ˈkɹæɔ̯n]^[3]

  • Audio (Virginia):

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• (General Australian, New Zealand) IPA^(key): /ˈkɹæɪ̯.ɔn/
• (Dublin) IPA^(key): /ˈkɹeː.än/, /ˈkɹɛ.jän/
• Rhymes: -eɪɒn, -eɪən, -æn, -aʊn
• Hyphenation: cray‧on

crayon (plural crayons)

1. A stick of colored chalk or wax used for drawing.

   Hyponym: Conté

2. (obsolete) A colored pencil, a colouring pencil

   Synonyms: pencil crayon (Canada), colouring pencil (UK)

   • 1695, C[harles] A[lphonse] du Fresnoy, translated by John Dryden, De Arte Graphica. The Art of Painting, […], London: […] J[ohn] Heptinstall for W. Rogers, […], →OCLC:

     Let no day pass over you […] without giving some strokes of the pencil or the crayon.

3. (dated) A crayon drawing, or a drawing with colored lines.
   • 1885, Littell's Living Age, volume 167, page 187:

     But on the wall hung two fine crayons, representing Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette — pictures which she recognized as having hung in the corridor of the Tuileries — and in front of them were burning two candles on a species of rude altar.

4. (dated) A pencil of carbon used in producing electric light.

• The /ˈkɹeɪ̯.ɑn/ (in the US CRAY-ahn, in dialects with the cot-caught merger also CRAY-awn) and /ˈkɹeɪ̯.ɔn/ (in the US CRAY-awn) pronunciations are used by 83% of Americans. The monosyllabic /kɹæn/ [kɹɛə̯n ~ kɹeə̯n] (cran) pronunciation is used by 14%. 1.46% pronounce it the same way as "crown" (/kɹaʊ̯n/), and 1.24% use other pronunciations (one of them /ˈkɹeɪ̯.ən/ CRAY-uhn).^[3]

• cretaceous

crayon (third-person singular simple present crayons, present participle crayoning or (rare) crayonning, simple past and past participle crayoned or (rare) crayonned)

1. (ambitransitive) To draw with a crayon.

• “crayon”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

• acyron

From craie (“chalk”) +‎ -on (diminutive suffix), derived from Latin crēta (“chalk, clay”).

• IPA^(key): /kʁɛ.jɔ̃/ ~ /kʁe.jɔ̃/

  • Audio:

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• (Louisiana) IPA^(key): /kɾe.jɔ̃/, /kɾi.jɔ̃/

• Audio (Lyon, France):

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• Audio (Toulouse, France):

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• Audio (Valais, Switzerland):

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• Audio (Vosges, France):

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• Audio (Vosges, France):

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• Rhymes: -ɔ̃
• Homophone: crayons

crayon m (plural crayons)

1. pencil
2. (colloquial) pen (writing utensil)

   Synonyms: plume (Louisiana), stylo

3. (vulgar, slang) cock, dick, prick

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:pénis

4. (Louisiana) crayon

   Synonym: pastel

5. (Louisiana) needlefish

   Synonym: aiguille (Louisiana)

• “crayon”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012
• Dictionary of Louisiana French: As Spoken in Cajun, Creole, and American Indian Communities (2009; →ISBN; →ISBN)

• Carnoy, caryon, Cayron, Cornay, Cronay, Cyrano, Roynac