Dialectal or archaic form of 'earn,' meaning to gain or deserve through work or effort.
Middle English variant of 'earn,' from Old English earnian 'to merit, win, gain.' This form persisted in northern English and Scots dialects while standard English adopted the 'ea' spelling.
The survival of 'arn' in dialect reveals how language preserves ancient forms in regional speech long after standard forms have changed. It's a linguistic fossil that connects modern speakers directly to medieval English, showing how working-class dialects often maintain older grammatical patterns.
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