ken

verb

1. (obsolete)To give birth, conceive, beget, be born; to develop (as a fetus); to nourish, sustain (as life).

   “To the soul this ghostly bread is the learning and the teaching and the understanding in the commandments of God, wherethrough the soul is kenned and lives.”

2. (Scotland, transitive)To know, perceive or understand.

   “It was noted by them that kenned best that her cantrips were at their worst when the tides in the Sker Bay ebbed between the hours of twelve and one.”

   “Johnny: Is your name Maggie? / Maggie: How'd you ken that? / Johnny: It's just a hunch. Are you looking for the, uh, petulant dwarf?”

   “Ah thought he wis being harsh, flippant and show-oafy, until ah got sae far in. Now ah ken precisely what the cunt meant.”

3. (Scotland, obsolete)To discover by sight; to catch sight of; to descry.

   “'Tis he. I ken the manner of his gate, / He riſes on the toe:”

   “I proposed to the Mariners, that it would be of great benefit in Navigation to make use of [the telescope] upon the round-top of a ship, to discover and kenne Vessels afar off.”

   “We ken them from afar.”

noun

1. (uncountable)Range of perception.

   “I had somehow the impression that he was on the point of letting go the ladder to swim away beyond my ken.”

2. (uncountable)Knowledge, perception, or sight.

   “So far is it from the kenne of theſe wretched projectors of ours that beſcraull their Pamflets every day with new formes of government for our Church.”

   “Within our ken / The Nightingale—ah! Love, the Nightingale! / Her tender sweetness made our cheeks grow pale,”

   “These people, these 20 or 25, were in my ken. Senator Jenner. In his what? Mr. Greenglass. My ken, my line of vision, my knowledge.”

   “On this occasion, I wrote to them: "Two more modest and deserving people than you are not in our ken; and it is but fitting that you receive this, preservation's most prestigious prize, for your selfless devotion to the cause through the years.”

   “Though he was out in the streets and away from the Firm and the Firm's ken, though he had work to do and action to relieve him, he was angry.”

3. (uncountable)Range of sight.

   “At once as far as Angels kenn he views / The dismal Situation waste and wilde […]”

4. (UK, regional, slang)A house, especially a den of thieves.

   “Ben mort, shall you and I heave a bough, mill a ken, or nip a bung, and then we'll couch a hogshead under the ruffmans, and there you shall wap with me, and I'll niggle with you.”

   “Ah, Bess, my covess, strike me blind if my sees don't tout your bingo muns in spite of the darkmans. Egad, you carry a bene blink aloft. Come to the ken alone—no! my blowen; did not I tell you I should bring a pater cove, to chop up the whiners for Dawson?”

   “Up she goes to any likely ken, where she knows there are women that are married or expect to get married, and commences begging.”

5. (Judaism)Youth or children's group.

   “Gilboa and Habonim Dror also run year-round programming, holding regional reunions (called kenim) up and down the state”

   “Gavriella: At an annual movement conference. I went for the first time, and we proposed creating new kenim [branches] and it was approved, which is amazing!”

   “At the beginning of 1944 he was sent to Debreccen to operate the local ken and to organize self-defense.”

6. A Japanese unit of length equal to six shakus.
7. The tsurugi (type of sword).

name

1. A diminutive of the male given name Kenneth.

   “The vote was 213-209 along party lines. Republican members of the House Ethics Committee – Michael Guest of Mississippi, Dave Joyce of Ohio, Andrew Garbarino of New York, John Rutherford of Florida and Michelle Fischbach of Minnesota – voted present. GOP Rep. Ken Buck of Colorado also voted present but he is not on the Ethics Committee.”

2. (colloquial, in-compounds)Kensington in London.

   “Kensington High Street — better known as High Street Ken after the nearby tube — is dominated architecturally by […]”

   “The ladies (and gentlemen) of South Ken and Chelsea do like their raw food, and Daphne's does a terrific tuna tartare with avocado and wild fennel, black figs, gorgonzola and hazelnuts; […]”

3. Synonym of Ken doll.

   “2007, Vanessa Rose Lee, The Beauty Queen and the School Nerd After the ceremony, the "Barbies and Kens" (excluding Tommy and Britney) gathered at Lindsay's mansion to have a barbeque party. They laughed and talked about good times and vowed to remain friends forever.”

4. A surname.