Word.ws English Dictionary

horn book

horn book is the alternative form of hornbook.

Meaning of hornbook

Noun

hornbook (plural hornbooks)

  1. (historical) A single page containing the alphabet, covered with a sheet of transparent horn, formerly used for teaching children to read.
    • Yes, yes, he teaches boyes the Horne-Booke: […]c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Loues Labour’s Lost”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
    Synonyms:
    battledore
  2. A legal textbook that provides a basic overview of a particular area of law.

Forms of horn book

pluralhorn books

Questions about horn book

What is horn book the alternative form of?
Horn book is the alternative form of hornbook.

Words near horn book in the dictionary

  1. horn angles
  2. horn antenna
  3. horn antennae
  4. horn antennas
  5. horn ball
  6. horn book
  7. horn books
  8. Horn clause
  9. Horn clauses
  10. horn coral
  11. horn corals

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: horn book (page history and authors); hornbook (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “horn book.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/horn_book. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.