Word.ws English Dictionary

summon

/ˈsʌmən/

summon verb: to call people together; to convene; to convoke.

Verb (1)

summon (third-person singular simple present summons, present participle summoning, simple past and past participle summoned)

  1. (transitive) To call people together; to convene; to convoke.
    • Silence is primary, summoning presence to itself; so it's a connection to the realm of origin.2007, John Zerzan, Silence
  2. (transitive) To ask someone to come; to send for.
    • The cousins separated, and Nain Singh joined a caravan posing as a merchant. This time he crossed the border successfully. Singh eventually entered Jih-k’a-tse, the second-largest city in Tibet. It was in Jih-k’a-tse that he was summoned to meet the country’s second-highest religious authority, the...1995, Explorers & Discoverers, volume 2, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 753
  3. To order (goods) and have delivered
    • You can summon groceries, alcohol and medicines to your home: chips and vodka on New Year’s Eve, say, and then aspirin on New Year’s Day.2019 November 21, Samanth Subramanian, “How our home delivery habit reshaped the world”, in The Guardian
  4. (transitive) To rouse oneself to exert a skill.
    • For securing the attainment of what he considered to be a most desirable end, he summoned all his abilities with a most praiseworthy energy and perseverance.1866, Pierre Bigandet, The Life or Legend of Gaudama, the Buddha of the Burmese, with annotations and notice on the Phongyies or Burmese monks, page 396
    • Joseph needed to summon all his reserve to keep his self-control, for no sooner had Asa voiced his request than Joseph recalled his remark to Aaron about a child being given to this couple in lieu of their giving Mary to him.2011, Sister Louise Sweigart, cgs, Joseph: A Guiding Light, Inspiring Voices →ISBN, page 61
  5. (transitive) To call a resource by magic.
    • “Why won't you teach me to summon water? I can summon fire so easily, it's only logical that I should learn to put out my mistakes.”2010, Kay Hooper, The Wizard of Seattle, Fanfare, →ISBN
  6. (transitive) To summons; convene.

Noun (1)

summon (plural summons)

  1. A creature magically summoned to do the summoner's bidding.
    • Conjuration magic in Baldur's Gate 3 allows players to summon a variety of helpful creatures […] These summons can assist players in combat and exploration, providing strategic advantages with their unique abilities.2023 October 30, Nyah Payne, “Baldur's Gate 3: Best Summons, Ranked”, in Gamerant
  2. call, command, order
    • The deceased was 58 years of age, was the picture of health even five or six hours prior to his death, when suddenly the grim messenger came with a summon from a Higher Tribunal, calling him to duties above.quoted in 2013, Robin Sterling, People and Things from the Cullman, Alabama Tribune 1898-1913 (page 172)

Noun (2)

summon (plural summons)

  1. (Malaysia, colloquial, slang) A fine; a fee or monetary penalty incurred for breaking the law; usually for a minor offence such as a traffic violation.
    • You better pay off the parking summon tomorrow before you kena interest on it.
    Synonyms:
    summons, saman
  2. (Malaysia, colloquial, slang) A notice of an infringement of the law, usually incurring such a penalty; a citation or ticket.

Verb (2)

summon (third-person singular simple present summons, present participle summoning, simple past and past participle summoned)

  1. (Malaysia, colloquial, slang, transitive) To impose such a fine or penalty, or to issue a notice thereof.
    • The police summoned the driver for speeding.
    • They kena summoned for littering.

summon meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

summon in Hindi

to ask someone to come
बुलाना bulānā, पुकारना pukārnā

summon in Tamil

அழைப்பாணை, வரவைப்பு, வரச்செய்வு, வரச்செயல், வரவழைப்பு, வரவழை

summon in Marathi

a summon
बोलावणे bōlāvaṇē
to summon
बोलावणे bōlāvaṇē

summon in Urdu

summon
سمن saman
More languagesFewer languages
summon in Bengali
ডেকে পাঠানো, সমন দেওয়া
summon in Telugu
రప్పించు rappiñcu
summon in Malayalam
വിളിപ്പിക്കുക, ആളയച്ചു വിളിപ്പിക്കുക, വിളിച്ചു വരുത്തുക, വരാൻ കല്പിക്കുക
summon in Kannada
ಕರೆ, ಬರಹೇಳು
summon in Punjabi
ਸੱਦਣਾ saddaṇā
summon in Odia
ଡକାଇବା ḍakāibā, ଡାକିବା ḍākibā
summon in Sanskrit
आमन्त्रयते āmantrayate, साधयति sādháyati, आह्वयति āhvayati
summon in Sinhala
කැඳනවා kæⁿdanawā
summon in Arabic
يَسْتَحْضِر yastaḥḍir, يَسْتَدْعِي yastadʕī

Examples of summon in a sentence

  • I summoned the waiter, paid the check, and hurried to leave.
  • I summoned the waiter, paid the cheque, and hurried to leave.
  • He summoned the waiter with a clap.

All 40 example sentences with summon

Synonyms of summon

All synonyms of summon

Forms of summon

Verb
third-person singular presentsummons
present participlesummoning
past participlesummoned
pastsummoned
second-person singular present (archaic)summonest
second-person singular past (archaic)summonedst
third-person singular present (archaic)summoneth
Noun
pluralsummons

Past tense of summon: summoned

Plural of summon: summons

Origin of summon

From Anglo-Norman somoundre, from Old French sumundre, from Latin summonēre, itself from sub + monēre, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *monéyeti, causative from *men- (“to think”). Compare typologically from the same PIE root mention, Russian помина́ть (pominátʹ), упомина́ть (upominátʹ) (developed less further, keeping strong relation with по́мнить (pómnitʹ)), also compare помина́й как зва́ли (pomináj kak zváli) (<+ звать (zvatʹ)).

Borrowed from Malay saman (“fine, financial penalty”), which is itself borrowed from English summons (“notice summoning someone to appear in court”). This sense re-emerged in English as summon likely due to the erroneous belief that the original singular English word summons is plural. Doublet of summons and saman.

Words formed from summon

Phrases with summon

Words that rhyme with summon

Questions about summon

What does summon mean?
Summon means to call people together; to convene; to convoke.
What is summon in Hindi?
Summon in Hindi is बुलाना (bulānā), पुकारना (pukārnā). See Summon meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is summon?
Summon can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce summon?
Summon is pronounced /ˈsʌmən/.
What is the past tense of summon?
The past tense of summon is summoned.

Words near summon in the dictionary

  1. summitters
  2. summitting
  3. Summitts
  4. Summitville
  5. summity
  6. summon
  7. summon auntie
  8. summon aunties
  9. summon up
  10. summonable
  11. summonables

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: summon (page history and authors); summon (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); बोलावणे (Marathi) (page history and authors); سمن (Urdu) (page history and authors); summon (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); summon (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); summon (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ਸੱਦਣਾ (Punjabi) (page history and authors); ଡକାଇବା (Odia) (page history and authors); आमन्त्रयते (Sanskrit) (page history and authors); කැඳනවා (Sinhala) (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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-summon.ogg.

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