maroon
see also: Maroon
Pronunciation
  • IPA: /məˈɹuːn/, /məˈɹəʊn/, /məˈɹəʉn/
Noun

maroon (plural maroons)

  1. An escaped negro slave of the Caribbean and the Americas or a descendant of escaped slaves. [from 17th c.]
    • 1985, Wade Davis (anthropologist), The Serpent and the Rainbow, Simon & Schuster, p. 193:
      Further north a Maroon community in the Bahoruco Mountains thrived for eighty-five years, until the French proposed a truce under the terms of which the Maroons would be permitted to form an independent clan.
    • 2007, Kevin Filan, The Haitian Vodou Handbook, Destiny Books 2007, p. 14:
      Joining others who had escaped before them, they formed communities of Maroons in which many traditional African customs and social mores were preserved.
  2. A castaway; a person who has been marooned. [from 19th c.]
    Synonyms: castaway
Translations
  • French: marron, marronne, nègre marron, négresse marronne, nègre libre, négresse libre
  • German: Maroon (Maroons, from English), Maroon-Männer, Maroon-Frauen
  • Russian: маро́н
  • Spanish: esclavo cimarrón, esclava cimarrona
Translations
  • German: Ausgesetzter, Ausgesetzte, Ausgestoßener, Ausgestoßene, Ausgestossener (Switzerland & Liechtenstein), Ausgestossene (Switzerland & Liechtenstein)
  • Italian: naufrago, naufraga
  • Russian: изго́й
Adjective

maroon (not comparable)

  1. Associated with Maroon culture, communities or peoples.
    • 2002, Cynthia James, The Maroon Narrative: Caribbean Literature in English Across Boundaries, Ethnicities, and Centuries, Heinemann Educational Books
      In her discussion of Michelle Cliff's Abeng, a novel that historicizes maroon culture and the Jamaican warrior heroine Nanny of the Maroons, Francoise Lionnet examines linguistic “metissage” […]
Translations
  • French: marron
  • German: Maroon-, der Maroons (genitive)
Verb

maroon (maroons, present participle marooning; past and past participle marooned)

  1. To abandon in a remote, desolate place, as on a desert island.
    • 2010, Brogan Steele, From the Jaws of Death: Extreme True Adventures of Man vs. Nature, St. Martin's Griffin (ISBN 9781429950114), page 231 ↗:
      After the harrowing stories of being marooned at sea and stranded in the frozen wastelands of Alaska and the Poles, one would think that survival on dry land would be easier […]
Translations Noun

maroon (plural maroons)

  1. A rich dark red, somewhat brownish, color.
     
    • 2009, Ben Long, The Nikon D90 Companion: Practical Photography Advice You Can Take Anywhere, O'Reilly Media, Inc. (ISBN 9780596555665), page 176 ↗:
      Is it a really dark maroon or a lighter maroon or a maroon that leans toward the red side? Or the magenta side? To address this issue, scientists use something called a color space.
Translations Adjective

maroon

  1. Of a maroon color
Translations Noun

maroon (plural maroons)

  1. (nautical) A rocket-propelled firework or skyrocket, often one used as a signal (e.g. to summon the crew of a lifeboat or warn of an air raid).
    • 1887, “Metropolitan Reports,” The Chemist and Druggist, 5 November, 1887, p. 564,
      On Sunday afternoon a serious firework explosion occurred in Lambeth, whereby three persons were seriously injured. Two lads […] purchased a firework called a “maroon”, which is a bomb consisting of a small ball of string covered with a red composition. It is loaded with gunpowder, and there is also a fuse attached.
    • 1891, William Archer (translator), “At the Fair” in Tales of Two Countries by Alexander Kielland, New York: Harper, p. 73,
      As the evening falls, colored lamps and Chinese lanterns are lighted around the venerable oak which stands in the middle of the fairground and boys climb about among its topmost branches with maroons and Bengal lights.
    • 1900, Alan C. Jenkins, Introducing Horses, London: Spring Books,
      Many a seaman’s life may have depended on equine speed and strength. Some of these ‘Lifeboat Horses’ used to recognise the maroon which was fired to summon the Lifeboat crew. Long after its retirement one of the horses which regularly helped to haul the Hoylake Lifeboat heard a maroon fired one day when it was working in the neighbouring fields. It immediately became very excited and made for the boathouse.
    • 1932, George Bernard Shaw, Too True to Be Good, Act II,
      And now I am off to inspect stores. There is a shortage of maroons that I don’t understand.
    • 1933, H. G. Wells, The Shape of Things to Come, Book 2, Chapter 9,
      The big air raids […] were much more dreadful than the air raids of the World War. They began with a nightmare of warning maroons, sirens, hooters and the shrill whistles of cyclist scouts, then swarms of frantic people running to and fro […]
Noun

maroon (plural maroons)

  1. (slang, derogatory) An idiot; a fool.
    Synonyms: Thesaurus:fool, Thesaurus:idiot
    • 2011, S. Watts Taylor, Tarnish, iUniverse (2011), ISBN 9781462002023, page 21 ↗:
      At least, I would not be sleeping that night. Why did I have that espresso? What a maroon!

Maroon
Noun

maroon (plural maroons)

  1. Alternative form of maroon
Proper noun
  1. Surname



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