Etymology From Middle English boon (“prayer”), from Old Norse bón (“prayer, petition”), from Proto-Germanic *bōniz (“supplication”), influenced by boon (“good, favorable”, adjective). Doublet of ben; see there for more.
1
A good thing; a thing to be thankful for or to appreciate duly.
Near-synonyms: gift; blessing, benefit; see also Thesaurus:gift
Finding the dry cave was a boon to the weary travellers.
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Anaesthetics are a great boon to modern surgery.
Diggle Station lies high up in the Pennine Chain, subject to extreme low temperatures. With this and heavy snowfall in the winter months, Diggle bids fair to compete with the Scottish lines under similar weather conditions, and the provision of unfrozen water in the higher ambient temperature of the tunnel must be a boon to harassed engine drivers whose thirsty steeds run short of water up the gruelling 1 in 125 seven-mile climb from Stalybridge.1959 February 23, “Letters to the Editor: Diggle Water Troughs”, in Railway Magazine, page 135:
Not long ago, it was difficult to produce photographs of tiny creatures with every part in focus. […] A photo processing technique called focus stacking has changed that. Developed as a tool to electronically combine the sharpest bits of multiple digital images, focus stacking is a boon to biologists seeking full focus on a micron scale.2013 July–August, Catherine Clabby, “Focus on Everything”, in American Scientist, volume 100, number 4, archived from the original on 07 Sep 2013:
In the other direction, treatments that were decried in their time as paving the road to hell, including vaccination, transfusions, anesthesia, artificial insemination, organ transplants, and in-vitro fertilization, have become unexceptional boons to human well-being.2015 August 1, Steven Pinker, “The moral imperative for bioethics”, in The Boston Globe, archived from the original on 03 Dec 2015:
2
That which is asked or granted as a benefit or favor; a gift or benefaction.
I gave you life. Can you not return the boon by giving me death, my lord?1871, James De Mille, The Cryptogram, New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers, →OCLC, page 194, column 2:
Every good gift and every perfect boon is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom can be no variation, neither shadow that is cast by turning.1881, English Revised Version, The New Testament, in the revised version of 1881, with fuller references, Oxford: Oxford University Press, published 1910, James 1:17, page 548:
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[T]he hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man[.]1949, Joseph Campbell, “The Hero and the God”, in The Hero with a Thousand Faces:
The wofull husbandman doth lowd complaine, / To ſee his whole yeares labor loſt ſo ſoone, / For which to God he made ſo many an idle boone.1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book III, Canto VII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 34, page 503:
4
UK, Dialectal An unpaid service due by a tenant to his lord.
5
Hinduism A blessing, typically a supernatural power, granted to an ascetic by a god or goddess.
A telling story is that of Vikra, who, after practicing severe tapas for many years, called on Śiva, asking him to grant the boon that whosoever's head he would touch, that person would die instantly.2007, Klaus Klostermaier, A Survey of Hinduism: Third Edition, New York: State University of New York Press, page 38:
Etymology From Middle English boon, bone, borrowed from Old Northern French boon, from Old French bon (“good”), from Latin bonus (“good”), from Old Latin duonus, dvenos, from Proto-Indo-European *dū- (“to respect”).
1
In boon companion Gay; merry; jovial; convivial.
Greedily ſhe ingorg’d without restraint, / And knew not eating Death: Satiate at length, / And hight’nd as with Wine, jocond and boon, / Thus to herſelf ſhe pleaſingly began.1667, John Milton, “Book IX”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC, lines 791-794:
I knovv the Infirmity of our Family; vve are apt to play the Boon-Companion, and throvv avvay our Money in our Cups: […]1712, Humphry Polesworth [pseudonym; John Arbuthnot], “How the Guardians of the Deceas’d Mrs. Bull’s Three Daughters Came to John, and What Advice They Gave Him; wherein in Briefly Treated the Characters of the Three Daughters: Also John Bull’s Answer to the Three Guardians”, in John Bull in His Senses: Being the Second Part of Law is a Bottomless-Pit. […], Edinburgh: […] James Watson, […], →OCLC, page 30:
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I’m a lonely old man; I lead a life that I don’t like, among boon companions, who make me melancholy.1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, “In or Near the Temple Garden”, in The History of Pendennis. […], volume II, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1850, →OCLC, page 110:
―No, Mr Bloom repeated again, I wouldn’t personally repose much trust in that boon companion of yours who contributes the humorous element, Dr Mulligan, as a guide, philosopher, and friend, if I were in your shoes.1922 February, James Joyce, “[Episode 16: Eumaeus]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC, part III [Nostos], page 576:
[T]he boon twins Art and Con aged thirty-seven years […]1953, Samuel Beckett, Watt, [Paris]: Olympia Press, →OCLC:
(2) "Everybody's boon companion, / Everybody's chaperon"; (3) "Everybody's boon companion: / Give[s] 'em everything he's got"1985, Herbert Kretzmer (English lyrics), Les Misérables (musical), "Master of the House," second and third refrains, fifth line
With mazie error under pendant ſhades / Ran Nectar, viſiting each plant, and fed /Flours worthy of Paradiſe which not nice Art / In Beds and curious Knots, but Nature boon / Powrd forth profuſe on Hill and Dale and Plaine, / […]1667, John Milton, “Book IV”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC, lines 239-243: