Bourne Meaning
/bɔːn/Definition, CEFR level C2, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
Listen pronunciation
Definition
nounA boundary; a limit.
nounA goal or destination.
Sentence Examples
The river flowed gently to its bourne.
The family's ancestral bourne was in Scotland.
The traveler reached his final bourne after a long journey.
CEFR Practice Quiz
In Shakespeare's play, Hamlet ponders the undiscovered ____ from which no traveler returns.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The lake was his favorite ____, a place where he could finally rest today.
Word Origin & History
From Middle French borne, from Old French bodne, from Medieval Latin bodina, a word of unknown ultimate origin, but possibly from Proto-Indo-European *bʰudʰmḗn (“bottom, base”), see also Proto-Celtic *bundos.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"[T]he dread of ſomething after death, / The vndiſcouer'd country, from whoſe borne / No trauiler returnes, puzzels the will, […]"
— c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke: […] (Second Quarto), London: […] I[ames] R[oberts] for N[icholas] L[ing] […], published 1604, →OCLC, [Act III, scene i], signatures G2, recto – G2, verso:
"[T]hough I did not stop in my advance, yet I went on slowly, like a man who should have passed a bourne unnoticed, and strayed into the country of the dead."
— 1879, Robert Louis Stevenson, “[Our Lady of the Snows.] Father Apollinaris.”, in Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes, 1st American edition, Boston, Mass.: Roberts Brothers, →OCLC, page 91:
"For though from out our bourne of Time and Place,
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crossed the bar."
— 1889, Alfred Tennyson, Crossing the Bar:
"I passed through many beautiful and majestic scenes; but my eyes were fixed and unobserving. I could only think of the bourne of my travels, and the work which was to occupy me whilst they endured."
— 1816 June – 1817 April/May (date written), [Mary Shelley], chapter I, in Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus. […], volume III, London: […] [Macdonald and Son] for Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor, & Jones, published 1 January 1818, →OCLC, page 12:
"When HBO airs “Behind the Candelabra” on May 26, the world will get to see Matt Damon play Liberace’s drug-addled, surgically enhanced lover – a role about as far from Jason Bourne as it gets."
— 2013 March 11, Adam Markovitz, “Matt Damon on (maybe) returning to ‘Bourne’ and playing Liberace’s lover”, in CNN:
Explore More C2 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
In Shakespeare's play, Hamlet ponders the undiscovered ____ from which no traveler returns.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The lake was his favorite ____, a place where he could finally rest today.