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minion

Noun
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

A favorite or darling; someone or something especially cherished. In older literary English it can mean a favored attendant or beloved thing.

Detailed Definition
Hopkins uses the word in a highly compressed, poetic way to describe the falcon as a favored creature of the morning. In modern English, the word is more often heard in a different sense, so readers may pause over it here. The line gives the bird a courtly, cherished status.
Example
Example in poetry:
Gerard Manley Hopkins’s “The Windhover”: “I caught this morning morning’s minion, kingdom of daylight’s dauphin”; Minion here means a beloved favorite or darling, not merely a servile follower; Hopkins praises the kestrel as the morning’s princely creature; “The sun’s minion flashed above the fields” can similarly make a bird seem favored by light
Additional Notes
In the quoted line, "minion" is an older literary word for a favorite or darling, not the everyday sense most readers know.; Found in the poem, The Windhover by Gerard Manley Hopkins
Also Known As
follower devotee attendant servant mignionet
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