gong

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a percussion instrument consisting of a set of tuned bells that are struck with a hammer

   I play the gongs at festivals.

2. 2
   noun

   a percussion instrument consisting of a metal plate that is struck with a softheaded drumstick

   I sound the gong that begins and ends mediation sessions.

3. 3
   verb

   to sound a gong

   I gonged at the 60s party.

4. 4
   noun

   A percussion instrument consisting of a metal disk that emits a loud resonant sound when struck with a soft hammer.

   All the time six or eight large Chinese gongs were being beaten by the vigorous arms of as many young men, producing such a deafening discord that I was glad to escape to the round house, where I slept very comfortably with half a dozen smoke-dried human skulls suspended over my head.

Simplified etymology

Gong entered English from Malay around 1600. Malays originally used the gong to signal troops; the passage specifically mentions its later use as a dinner gong.

From Middle English gong, from Old English gong, where it was originally a variant of the noun gang (“a going, walk, journey, way, etc.”), derived from the verb gangan (“to go, walk, travel”), whose relation to go in Proto-Germanic remains unclear. Doublet of gang.

Topics

External links

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• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary