knell

American  

[nel] / nɛl /

noun

1. the sound made by a bell rung slowly, especially for a death or a funeral.

2. a sound or sign announcing the death of a person or the end, extinction, failure, etc., of something.

   the knell of parting day.

3. any mournful sound.

---

verb (used without object)

• knells,
  present (3rd person singular)
• knelled,
  past participle,  past
• knelling
  present participle

1. to sound, as a bell, especially a funeral bell.

2. to give forth a mournful, ominous, or warning sound.

verb (used with object)

• knells,
  present (3rd person singular)
• knelled,
  past participle,  past
• knelling
  present participle

1. to proclaim or summon by, or as if by, a bell.

knell British  

/ nɛl /

noun

1. the sound of a bell rung to announce a death or a funeral

2. something that precipitates or indicates death or destruction

---

verb

1. (intr) to ring a knell

2. (tr) to proclaim or announce by or as if by a tolling bell

knell Idioms  

1. see death knell.

---

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• unknelled
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Participles

• knelling
  present
• knelled
  past

Conjugated Forms

Present

• knell
  simple
• knells
  simple
• have knelled
  perfect
• has knelled
  perfect
• am knelling
  progressive
• are knelling
  progressive
• is knelling
  progressive
• have been knelling
  perfect progressive
• has been knelling
  perfect progressive

Past

• knelled
  simple
• had knelled
  perfect
• was knelling
  progressive
• were knelling
  progressive
• had been knelling
  perfect progressive

Future

• will knell
  simple
• will have knelled
  perfect
• will be knelling
  progressive
• will have been knelling
  perfect progressive

Etymology

Origin of knell

before 950; (noun) Middle English knel, Old English cynll; (v.) Middle English knellen, knyllen, Old English cynllan; cognate with Old Norse knylla to beat, strike; akin to Dutch knal bang, knallen to bang, German Knall explosion, knallen to explode

Explanation

A knell is a ringing sound, particularly from a bell tolled to announce a death or the end of something. Which is kind of depressing. From the Old English cnyll, meaning “sound made by a bell when struck or rung slowly,” comes our modern day knell. It certainly describes the slow, ominous sound of funeral bells, but isn't always used so literally: We often say that a final blow or action that will bring an end to something sounds or signals the death knell. And if you hear a bell knell in your dreams, look out — superstition says that's not a good sign.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

knell knells knelled knelling

It is a death knell for a long-held belief among media executives that putting content and the “pipes” that delivered it under one roof would create riches for all.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 30, 2026

Is this the death knell of American political satire?

From Salon ● May 19, 2026

People on the internet seem to be taking Lindy West’s memoir as millennial feminism’s final death knell.

From Slate ● Mar. 31, 2026

“In California, that’s not a death knell, that’s a life force.”

From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 8, 2025

These words fell like the knell of doom—

From "Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Brontë

Time magazine tagged her as one of the death knells of feminism, which seems harsh.

From The Guardian ● Sep. 25, 2017

They worked for him at Modern Photography, Holiday, Travel & Leisure, Town & Country and other publications, most of them gone long before the Internet began sounding its knells for the printed page.

From New York Times ● Jun. 13, 2015

Despite the death knells, Luke Donald spent part of the year at No. 1, and after dropping to No. 3, supplanted Woods at No. 2 by December.

From Golf Digest ● Dec. 5, 2012

And it was he who spoke to Wade, in dreadful tones, like knells.

From The Mysterious Rider by Zane Grey

Clerk's Ales have vanished, too, together with the cakes and eggs, but his fees remain, and marriage bells and funeral knells, christenings and churchings bring to him the accustomed dues and offerings.

From The Parish Clerk by P. H. (Peter Hampson) Ditchfield

To-morrow—” He fell silent; again in his heart that parting cadence knelled with keen and intolerable sorrow.

From Stepsons of Light by Eugene Manlove Rhodes

But when the trumpet's warring blast   Had knelled the fate that tyrants know, They proved no laggards at the last,   And sprang to meet their country's foe.

From Cap and Gown A Treasury of College Verse by Frederic Lawrence Knowles

I cannot guess nor tell; only it comes and comes, As from a vaster world beyond my door, From centuries of eld, the death of freedom knelled, A host of mortal fears at my door.

From Behind the Arras A Book of the Unseen by Thomas Buford Meteyard

Then the mournful answer knelled to her heart, and the recurrent spasms of that first agony slowly, surely settled into one dead pain, as the truth was seared into her knowledge.

From Children of the Mist by Eden Phillpotts

There was no bell to toll there—but at the very moment he was ascending the scaffold, a black cloud knelled thunder, and many hundreds of people all at once fell down upon their knees.

From Recreations of Christopher North, Volume I (of 2) by John Lyde Wilson

While many of the world's thinkers are worried about the proliferation of births, it is the knelling sound of death that keeps us awake at night.

From Time Magazine Archive

In every traveler's eulogy there is a strain of elegy, and every traveler hearkens to the raven's knelling cry of "Nevermore."

From Time Magazine Archive

Your husband was on the further side, knelling.

From Robert Elsmere by Mrs. Humphry Ward

The looks are bent on the shaking ground, And the heart beats loud with a knelling sound; Swift by the breasts that must bear the brunt, Gallops the major along the front— "Halt!"

From The Poems of Schiller — First period by Friedrich Schiller

"You are forty-two, you are old, you are nobody," was knelling through her brain.

From The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories by Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton