Other forms: lawns
A lawn is the area of short cut grass in front of or behind a house. Mown in stripes if the owner is serious about it.
It is one of the central objects of British domestic life, and it brings its own equipment and vocabulary — a lawnmower, lawn edging, a lawn that needs feeding. Sports keep the word in lawn tennis and lawn bowls, both named to distinguish them from indoor versions. A lawn is defined by being maintained, which is what separates it from a field or a meadow.
1nounlawnAn area of closely mown grass in a garden or park.
“He spent Sunday morning mowing the lawn.”
A lawn was a glade. Middle English launde came from Old French lande, a heath or a moor, so the word began as open ground in a wood and only later became something you mow.
Proto-Indo-European
*lendʰ- — land, heath
Proto-Celtic
*landā
Proto-Germanic
*landą — land
Old French
lande — heath, moor
Middle English
launde
English, today
lawn
Built from
From laune, from laund. Early Modern English laune (“turf, grassy area”), alteration of laund (“glade”), from Middle English launde, from Old French lande (“heath, moor”), of gem - or cel-gau - origin, from Proto-Germanic landą (“land”) or Proto-Celtic landā, both from Proto-Indo-European lendʰ- (“land, heath”). Akin to Breton lann (“heath”), Old Norse - & Old English land. a doublet of land and lande.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA