kern

Meanings

1. A corn; grain; kernel.
2. The last handful or sheaf reaped at the harvest.
3. The harvest home.
4. A doll or figurine raised in celebration of a successful harvest; kern-baby.

1. Any part of a letter which extends into the space used by another letter.

1. To adjust the horizontal space between selected pairs of letters (characters or glyphs); to perform such adjustments to a portion of text, according to preset rules.

1. A light-armed foot soldier of the ancient militia of Ireland and Scotland; in archaic contexts often used as a term of contempt.
2. A boor; a low person.
3. An idler; a vagabond.

1. Alternative form of quern.

1. A churn.

1. A surname.
2. An unincorporated community in Macon County, Missouri, United States.
3. A river in California, United States.

Etymology

From Middle English curn, cooren, variant forms of Middle English corn, see English corn and also Dutch kern, Old High German kerno, cherno, Middle High German kerne, kern, German Kern (“core, kernel”), Old Norse kjarni, Icelandic kjarni, Danish kjerne, Swedish kärna (“core, kernel”); see also kernel.