passing bell

noun

1. a bell tolled to announce a death or funeral.

2. a portent or sign of the passing away of anything.

passing bell

noun

1. Also called: death bell.  death knell. a bell rung to announce a death or a funeral

Word History and Origins

Origin of passing bell¹

First recorded in 1520–30

Example Sentences

He died in a fever, and upon tolling of his passing bell, she cry’d out My heart is broken and in a few hours expired, purely thro’ love, March 15, 1714-15.

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Within, without your cabins rude As toiling builders well you wrought, With busy hands and constant hearts, And eager children wisdom taught; Long be delayed the passing bell, Long be it ere we say “Farewell!”

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It is said that if in a theater the tinkle of a passing bell is heard, actors and audience fall on their knees.

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A gentleman who lay upon a severe sick bed, heard a passing bell ring out, and thereupon asked his physician: “Tell me, maister Doctor, is yonder musicke for my dancing?”

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Bede, in speaking of the death of the Abbess of St. Hilda, says that a sister in a distant monastery thought that she heard in her sleep the well-known sound of the passing bell.

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