tocsin

An alarm or other signal sounded by a bell or bells, originally especially with reference to France.

Noun

  1. An alarm or other signal sounded by a bell or bells, originally especially with reference to France.
    • At half-past one, on the sounding of the tocsin (or bell of the public-house) about fifteen persons were collected, when the Rev. J. Bromley was called to the chair. - 1804 August 23, The Times, p.3 col. C:
    • The noise of drumming and trumpeting came from the Albany Street Barracks, and every church within earshot was hard at work killing sleep with a vehement disorderly tocsin. - 1895–1897, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, “In...
    • As she entered the projection theatre the soundtrack reverberated across the sculpture garden, a melancholy tocsin modulated by Talbert’s less and less coherent commentary. - 1970, JG Ballard, The Atrocity Exhibition:
  2. A bell used to sound an alarm.

Origin

Borrowed from Middle French, from Old French toquesain (modern tocsin), from Old Occitan tocasenh, from tocar (“strike, touch”) + senh (“bell”).

Forms

tocsins