thunder

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   to make or produce a loud noise

   The river thundered below

2. 2
   verb

   move fast, noisily, and heavily

   The bus thundered down the road

3. 3
   verb

   be the case that thunder is being heard

   Whenever it thunders, my dog crawls under the bed

4. 4
   noun

   The loud rumbling, cracking, or crashing sound caused by expansion of rapidly heated air around a lightning bolt.

   Thunder is preceded by lightning.

5. 5
   noun

   A deep, rumbling noise resembling thunder.

   Off in the distance, he heard the thunder of hoofbeats, signalling a stampede.

6. 6
   noun

   An alarming or startling threat or denunciation.

   The thunders of the Vatican could no longer strike into the heart of princes.

7. 7
   noun

   The discharge of electricity; a thunderbolt.

   The revenging gods / 'Gainst parricides did all their thunders bend.

8. 8
   noun

   Synonym of thunder word.

   Adam's fall and Vico's thunder are embodied in a word of a hundred letters, the first of ten thunders in the Wake.

Etymology

From Middle English thunder, thonder, thundre, thonre, thunnere, þunre, from Old English þunor (“thunder”), from Proto-West Germanic *þunr, from Proto-Germanic *þunraz, from Proto-Indo-European *(s)ten-, *(s)tenh₂- (“to thunder”). Compare astound, astonish, stun. Germanic cognates include West Frisian tonger, Dutch donder, German Donner, Old Norse Þórr (English Thor), Danish torden, Norwegian Nynorsk tore. Other cognates include Persian تندر (tondar), Latin tonō, detonō, Ancient Greek στένω (sténō), στενάζω (stenázō), στόνος (stónos), Στέντωρ (Sténtōr), Irish torann, Welsh taran, Gaulish Taran…