an entertainer who wears colourful clothes and exaggerated make-up and performs funny tricks to make people laugh, especially in a circus
The clown twisted balloons into animal shapes for the delighted children.
A tall clown with a red nose rode a tiny bicycle around the ring.
✦ Late 16th-century: originally meaning “rustic” or “clumsy fellow,” from a Scandinavian source related to Swedish ‘kluns’ (“block, lump”). It later came to mean a comic performer in a circus.
a person who behaves in a silly, foolish, or annoying way
Stop acting like a clown and focus on your homework.
Jake is the office clown, always telling jokes during meetings.
to behave in a silly or playful way, often to make other people laugh
The students kept clowning instead of starting the experiment.
He clowned on stage to loosen up the nervous audience before the lecture.
