Can

How to spell can

3 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce can

What does can mean?

1. verbTo have the ability, permission, or possibility to do something.
2. nounA sealed metal container for food, drink, or other contents.
3. verbTo preserve food by sealing it in airtight containers.

Can in a sentence

• verb

  With practice you can learn to read a balance sheet.

• noun

  She opened a can of soup for a quick lunch.

• verb

  Every autumn they can tomatoes from the garden.

• verb

  Staff can park in the rear lot after six in the evening.

• noun

  The recycling bin held one empty drink can.

• verb

  The factory will can fruit during the harvest season.

Where does can come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

The word actually covers two separate stories that happen to be spelled the same. The modal verb comes from the Old English cunnan, which literally meant 'to know' or 'to know how to do something', and is closely related to the words 'know', 'cunning', and 'ken'. Over the centuries the meaning drifted from knowing a skill to simply being able to do it, which is why we now say someone can swim rather than knows to swim. The noun for a metal container is quite distinct, descending from the Old English canne, a word for a cup or vessel that has cousins across the Germanic languages. The verb meaning to preserve food in sealed containers was coined much later, in the early nineteenth century, directly from that noun. So a single short word holds both a deep Anglo-Saxon idea of ability and a humble word for a drinking vessel.

How the word is built

• can (from Old English cunnan, to know how to); as a noun, an unrelated Old English word canne, a container