Word.ws English Dictionary

pavon

pavon noun: a small triangular flag, especially one attached to a knight's lance; a pennon. Also the alternative form of pavane.

Noun

pavon (plural pavons)

  1. A small triangular flag, especially one attached to a knight's lance; a pennon.
    • High silken pavilions or colored marquees, shooting up from among the crowd of meaner dwellings, marked where the great lords and barons of Leon and Castile displayed their standards, while over the white roofs, as far as eye could reach, the waving of ancients, pavons, pensils, and banderoles...1890, Arthur Conan Doyle, The White Company, page 325
    • In modern parlance, under the generic name of flag is included standards, ancients or ensigns, banners, bannerolls, pavons, colors, streamers, pennons, pennoncelles, gonfanons, guidons , coronetts or coronells (hence the title of colonel), and the like.1894, George Henry Preble, History of the Flag of the United States of America, page 5
  2. The peacock bass
    • A pavon on every cast and my hands were raw from grabbing their jaws.1972 May, A.J. McClane, “Amazon......wonder World of Fishes”, in Field & Stream, volume 77, number 1, page 100
    • A fast, noisy retrieve excited most strikes; if a pavon swirled short, a dancing lure usually triggered a follow-up attempt.1991 July, Joe Doggett, “Proud of a Peacock”, in Field & Stream, volume 96, number 3, page 70
  3. (South-America) Any of various birds with ornate plumage, similar to a peacock.
    • To console our bereavement somewhat, she sent down to the galliota a pair of young, noisy, half-fledged parrots, and a pavon or sun-bird .1855, William Henry Edwards, A Voyage Up the River Amazon, Including a Residence at Pará, page 171
    • This is often stated to be the female of the pavon, but the opinion is erroneous, the pava not even appearing to belong to the same genus as the pavon, and having more the characer of a Penelope or Salpiza.1859, Julius Fröbel, Seven Years' Travel in Central America, Northern Mexico, and the Far West of The United States
  4. A tropical butterfly, Doxocopa pavon, noted for the iridescent purple coloration of the male.
    • The Pavon is yet another tropical member of the huge Brush-footed Butterfly family that just barely enters the United States, in southeast Texas, and even there only rarely.2002, Lisa Bonforte, Jan Sovak, Paul E. Kennedy, Color and Learn Birds, Butterflies and Wild Flowers, page 89
    • Then, as I was spreading Ben's special brew on the big log over the wash, a general call went up: "Pavon!" I ran,and there was Doxocopa pavon all right, on a fruit basket.2010, Robert Michael Pyle, Mariposa Road: The First Butterfly Big Year
  5. A subtropical plant of genus Peperomia.
    • The Pavon plant , which appears to be similar to Mandon No. 1123 , has no ripe fruits , but was probably the plant on which the original description was based , for Pentland's plant is without doubt a specimen of P. peruviana, Dahlst1907, Isaac Bayley Balfour, Roland Thaxter, Vernon Herbert Blackman, Annals of Botany - Volume 21, page 140
  6. A hydrochloride of opium alkaloid, similar to Pantopon, used as a pain medication.
    • This indicates that pavon is a diluted pantopon, a pavon tablet is equivalent to half a pantopon tablet , and an ampule of pavon to half a ampule of pantopon .1922, International Medical and Surgical Survey, page 468
    • Many similar preparations have appeared since, viz., glykopon, glykomekon, totopon, holopon, pavon, etc.1924, Year Book of the American Pharmaceutical Association, page 228

Proper noun capitalized: Pavon

Pavon (plural Pavons)

  1. A surname.

Also used as

pavon is also the alternative form of pavane.

Examples of pavon in a sentence

  • Another flag, a pavon, is bendy of 10 arg. and az . which is a Mountford, Montford, or Montfort coat.1905, Bodleian Library, A Summary Catalogue of Western Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, page xix:
  • Some of these books contain illustrations of this flag; nevertheless there is not, nor has there ever been, bunting of any shape or size named a pavon.1963, Julian Franklyn, Shield and Crest: An Account of the Art and Science of Heraldry, page 183:
  • The pavon shape was popular in the fourteenth century.2012, Terence Wise, Medieval European Armies, page 39:
  • In Venezuela, the pavon is the national freshwater fish of the country.1993, Larry Larsen, Peacock Bass Explosions, page 18:

Forms of pavon

Noun
pluralpavons
Proper noun
pluralPavons

Origin of pavon

From Latin pavo (“peacock”).

Questions about pavon

What does pavon mean?
Pavon means a small triangular flag, especially one attached to a knight's lance; a pennon.
How do you use pavon in a sentence?
Another flag, a pavon, is bendy of 10 arg. and az . which is a Mountford, Montford, or Montfort coat.
What part of speech is pavon?
Pavon can be a noun or a proper noun.
What is the plural of pavon?
The plural of pavon is pavons.

Words near pavon in the dictionary

  1. Pavloving
  2. Pavlovs
  3. Pavlovsk
  4. PAVN
  5. Pavo
  6. pavon
  7. pavonated
  8. pavonazzetto
  9. Pavonazzo
  10. pavone
  11. pavones

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: pavon (page history and authors); Pavon (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.

Last updated:

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