Noun: loon
Sample Sentences
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An electric fire came next, followed by an umbrella and then a colander. "This bowl will carry no water," he muttered. "Some loon hath pierced it with holes." [1971, Richard Carpenter, Catweazle and the Magic Zodiac, Harmondsworth: Puffin Books, page 67:]
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What's it like to be a loon? / I liken it to a balloon [1971, Marc Bolan, “Cosmic Dancer”, in Electric Warrior, performed by T. Rex:]
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The diuell damne thee blacke, thou cream-fac'd Loone: Where got'ſt thou that Gooſe-looke. [c. 1606 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Macbeth”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene iii], page 149:]
Nouns inflected like loon
soldier's woundwort,
Nicosian,
whopper,
greypate,
tactile sign language,
chronotrope,
Rosie Lee,
dissentient,
photoinactivator,
sulphonediimine,
coastal waterfall,
residuary devise,
bituminization,
nitrosonaphthol,
smṛiti,
geosphere,
backscreen,
mensuralist,
flocculate,
flocculant, etc. (List truncated at 20 nouns)
Etymology
From Middle English louen, lowen (“rascal; rogue”), probably of Middle Dutch or Middle Low German origin. Compare Dutch loen (“simpleton”). Or, related to etymology 2, due to the bird's loud cry. Folk etymology associates it slang-wise with lunatic, though the latter may have influenced it; see loony.
Verbs referencing "loon"
Icelandic Nouns
lómur.