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Curfew vs Knell - What's the difference?

curfew | knell |

As nouns the difference between curfew and knell

is that curfew is any regulation requiring people to be off the streets and in their homes by a certain time while knell is the sound of a bell knelling; a toll.

As a verb knell is

to ring a bell slowly, especially for a funeral; to toll.

curfew

English

Alternative forms

* cover-few (obsolete)

Noun

(wikipedia curfew) (en noun)
  • Any regulation requiring people to be off the streets and in their homes by a certain time.
  • * 2012 October 31, David M. Halbfinger, " Hurricane Sandy," New York Times (retrieved 31 October 2012):
    • Localities across New Jersey imposed curfews to prevent looting. In Monmouth, Ocean and other counties, people waited for hours for gasoline at the few stations that had electricity. Supermarket shelves were stripped bare.
  • The time when such restriction begins.
  • A signal indicating this time.
  • A fireplace accessory designed to bank a fire by completely covering the embers.
  • (historical) A regulation in feudal Europe by which fires had to be covered up or put out at a certain fixed time in the evening, marked by the ringing of an evening bell.
  • The evening bell, which continued to be rung in many towns after the regulation itself became obsolete.
  • *, Folio Society, 2006, vol.1, p.95:
    • I have my lodging neere unto a tower, where both evening and morning a very great bell doth chime Ave marie'' and ''Cover-few , which jangling doth even make the tower to shake.

    Derived terms

    * curfew pass

    See also

    * martial law * state of emergency * state of siege

    knell

    English

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • to ring a bell slowly, especially for a funeral; to toll.
  • * Beaumont and Fletcher
    • not worth a blessing nor a bell to knell for thee
  • * , The New Timon. A romance of London , Chapter 86
    • Yet all that poets sing, and grief hath known, / Of hopes laid waste, knells in that word, alone .
  • to signal or proclaim something by ringing a bell.

    • Noun

    (en noun)
  • the sound of a bell knelling; a toll.
  • * 1750 , , Line 1
    • The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,

    Derived terms

    * death knell