Other forms: intoned, intones, intoning
To intone is to speak or chant on a level note. Intone the words, intone a prayer, intone solemnly.
It belongs to liturgy, where a priest intones a line and the congregation answers, and to any voice flat enough to sound like it. Used of ordinary speech it is faintly mocking, suggesting somebody enjoying their own solemnity.
1verbintoneTo speak or chant on a level note.
“The monks intoned their prayers in the candlelit chapel.”
intone is a speaking.
Medieval Latin intonare, from in plus tonus, a tone. Intonation is the same root.
Medieval Latin
intonō
Old French
entoner
Middle English
entune
English, today
intone
From Middle English entune, entone, from Old French entoner, from Medieval Latin intonō, from in- + tonus + -ō; a doublet of intonate. Cognate with French entonner, Italian intonare.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA