Hun

Meaning

Noun

1. A member of a nomadic tribe (the Huns) who invaded Europe in the fourth century from Central Asia.
2. A vandal, a barbarian, an uncivilized destructive person.
3. (slang) A German.
4. (slang) A Protestant.
5. (slang) A Rangers Football Club supporter; an Orangeman.

Name

A surname from Khmer.

Synonyms

Boche

Jerry

Kraut

Krauthead

German

🇩🇪

vandal

Hungarian

🇭🇺

barbarian

Goth

Pronounced as (IPA)

/hʌn/

Etymology

From Old English Hūnas, Hūne (both plural), from Late Latin Hunni, from Koine Greek Οὗννοι (Hoûnnoi), borrowed through Middle Iranian. Cognate with Old Norse húnir, Old High German Hunni. See also etymology of Xiongnu.
Compare Sogdian [script needed] (xwn), Sanskrit हूण (hūṇa), and 匈奴 (OC *hoŋ-nâ) (c. 318 BCE) > *hɨoŋ-nɑ (Eastern Han), which Schuessler (2014:264) proposes to be transcription of foreign *Hŏna ~ Hŭna. More at Huns.
As a derogatory term for Germans popularized by Rudyard Kipling, reacting to Germany's proposal that the Royal Navy be used to collect debts from Venezuela.