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orisons

Archaic Terms
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

Solemn prayers, devotions, or spiritual petitions; an archaic noun frequent in sacred, meditative, and elegiac verse.

Detailed Definition
An orison is an old literary word for a prayer or act of praying. In Owen’s poem, it fits the funeral setting and helps contrast religious ritual with the violence of war.
Example
Example in poetry:
“Can patter out their hasty orisons” means prayers, especially spoken or recited prayers; “At dawn, the monks lifted orisons through incense” gives devotional context; Shakespeare uses “orisons” in “Nymph, in thy orisons / Be all my sins remembered”; “Her orisons were names of the disappeared” extends prayer into civic mourning.
Additional Notes
The word appears in the line “Can patter out their hasty orisons,” and it is an archaic term many modern readers would need to look up.; Found in the poem, Anthem for Doomed Youth by Wilfred Owen
Also Known As
prayers supplications invocations entreaties
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