dawn

A new day dawns.

In the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene[…]to see the sepulchre.

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Matthew xxviii:1:

(intransitive) To begin to brighten with daylight.

I don’t want to be there when the truth dawns on him.

Although the Celebrity was almost impervious to sarcasm, he was now beginning to exhibit visible signs of uneasiness, the consciousness dawning upon him that his eccentricity was not receiving the ovation it merited.

1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter V, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:

(intransitive, figurative) To start to appear or be realized.

in dawning youth

1697, Virgil, translated by John Dryden, The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:

when life awakes, and dawns at every line

1695, C[harles] A[lphonse] du Fresnoy, translated by John Dryden, De Arte Graphica. The Art of Painting, […], London: […] J[ohn] Heptinstall for W. Rogers, […], →OCLC:

And love will last as pure and whole / As when he loved me here in Time, / And at the spiritual prime / Rewaken with the dawning soul.

1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, Canto XLII, page 65:

(intransitive, figurative) To begin to give promise; to begin to appear or to expand.

en-verb

dawn (third-person singular simple present dawns, present participle dawning, simple past and past participle dawned)

dawns (present singular third-person)
dawning (participle present)
dawned (participle past)
dawned (past)

Back-formation from dawning. (If the noun rather than the verb is primary, the noun could directly continue dawing.) Compare daw (“to dawn”).


dawn

(uncountable) The morning twilight period immediately before sunrise.

She rose before dawn to meet the train.

(uncountable) The time when the sun rises.

the dawn of civilization

The dawn of the oil age was fairly recent. Although the stuff was used to waterproof boats in the Middle East 6,000 years ago, extracting it in earnest began only in 1859 after an oil strike in Pennsylvania. The first barrels of crude fetched $18 (around $450 at today’s prices).

2013 August 3, “Yesterday’s fuel”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8847:

(uncountable) The earliest phase of something.

en-noun

dawn (countable and uncountable, plural dawns)

it is always darkest just before the dawn

the darkest hour is always just before the dawn

the darkest hour is just before the dawn

𐭠𐭥𐭱𐭡𐭠𐭬

ʾʿšbʾm /ōšebām/